Ride For Life: ALS Therapy Development Foundation Appoints Clinical Advisory Board

NEWTON, Mass., April 24 /PRNewswire/ -- The ALS Therapy Development Foundation (ALS-TDF) today announced the appointment of its Clinical Advisory Board (CAB), comprised of world-leading researchers in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), also called Lou Gehrig's disease. Experts in researching, diagnosing and treating ALS, the group will provide scientific and strategic input on advancing ALS-TDF's drug development program.

"The establishment of our Clinical Advisory Board is a critical step in achieving our mission to develop effective treatments for people living with ALS," said James Heywood, ALS-TDF's Founding Director. "Our approach to drug development depends on combining in-house technology and expertise with key collaborators to investigate near-market drugs. By working in partnership with members of our clinical advisory board, we join forces with the world's most authoritative ALS researchers."

"ALS-TDF's collaborative approach to drug development is fostering a unique research environment that I believe has great promise for finding an effective treatment for ALS," said Dr. Richard K. Olney, M.D., Director of the ALS Research and Patient Care Center at the University of California San Francisco and member of ALS-TDF's Clinical Advisory Board.

The following researchers have been named to the ALS-TDF Clinical Advisory Board:

-- Benjamin Rix Brooks, M.D., Director of the ALS Clinic and the MDA/ALS
Clinical Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

-- Robert H. Brown, Jr., D.Phil., M.D., Director of the Day Neuromuscular
Laboratory and Muscular Dystrophy Clinic at the Massachusetts General
Hospital

-- Merit Cudkowicz, M.D., M.Sc., Co-Director of the Neurology Clinical
Trial Unit and ALS Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital

-- Dallas A. Forshew, R.N., B.S.N., Manager of the ALS Center at the
University of California San Francisco

-- Robert Miller, M.D., Director of the Forbes Norris MDA/ALS Clinical
Research Center at California Pacific Medical Center

-- Hiroshi Mitsumoto, M.D., Medical Director of The Eleanor and Lou Gehrig
MDA/ALS Research Center

-- Richard K. Olney, M.D., Director of the ALS Research and Patient Care
Center at the University of California San Francisco

-- Jeffrey Rothstein, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of the Robert Packard Center
for ALS Research, and Director of the MDA/ALS Clinic at Johns Hopkins
University

About ALS
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a fatal neurological disorder that affects thousands of Americans each year, causing paralysis through the progressive death of motor neurons. Thirty thousand Americans have ALS, and 250,000 Americans alive today will eventually die from the disease. Although ALS mainly affects patients over fifty, it can strike at any age. It also strikes without warning -- nine out of ten patients have no family history of the disease. Most patients die within four years of diagnosis. There currently is no known cure.

About ALS-TDF
Founded in 1999, the ALS Therapy Development Foundation (ALS-TDF) is dedicated to discovering and developing treatments for ALS. The organization, which runs the largest centralized drug discovery program in ALS, has collaborated with 28 for-profit companies and academic institutions to perform advanced investigations of more than 50 near-patient drugs in its laboratories. Since the launch of its in vivo drug-screening program in 2001, ALS-TDF has discovered two novel therapeutic targets in ALS and identified four lead drug candidates. In 2003, the Foundation will sponsor clinical trials at leading ALS clinics to help bring the most promising drug candidates closer to FDA approval.

CONTACT: Rebecca Heidgerd of ALS Therapy Development Foundation, +1-617- 796-8826, rheidgerd@als.net; or Dana Jessup of Feinstein Kean Healthcare, +1- 617-761-6734, djessup@fkhealth.com