The largest ever attended Movement Disorder Society Congress came to a close today, and the Society marked the end of the week with a “Blue Ribbon Highlights” session marking the best research presented during the proceedings.  Out of over 1,500 projects, about only 30 were given special commendation, including Fox Trial Finder, The Michael J. Fox Foundation’s (MJFF) Web-based clinical trial matching tool.

Highlighted projects with ties to MJFF were aplenty, including 11 clinical studies.  Here, a few of those mentioned:

• During the course of the week, the Parkinson’s Progression Markers Initiative (PPMI) made five separate presentations highlighting progress being made in the landmark biomarker study.  One of these from Daniel Weintraub, MD, was marked for Blue Ribbon distinction.  Weintraub’s work focused on the link between Impulse Control Disorder (ICD) and Parkinson’s disease (PD).  The study found that Parkinson’s itself does not confer a higher risk for ICD, supporting other research that suggests the high prevalence of ICD in people with PD is related to Parkinson’s medications, and not the disease itself.
• Also commended was STEADY-PD, a study testing the drug isradipine, approved to treat high blood pressure, for its potential as a disease-modifying therapy for PD.  While the study did find a dose of the drug to be safe for people with PD, it wasn’t yet shown to be efficacious – the next step will be to design a study to determine this.
• A couple of other studies with positive clinical results targeting innovative treatments for PD that we mentioned earlier in the week were also awarded Blue Ribbon status, including a study into dipraglurant, a drug from Addex Therapeutics that targets the glutamate system to treat dyskinesia, and one testing Abbott Laboratories’ levodopa-carbidopa intestinal gel (LCIG).

A final note: Next year’s Congress will take place in Sydney, Australia from June 16- June 20.