There has been a lot of progress made in the fight against Alzheimer’s over the last two years, and the Sept. 19 Walk to End Alzheimer’s in New Richmond serves as a celebration of that progress. Registration for the event is at 8:30 a.m. at Hillside Elementary, with a ceremony at 9:40 a.m. and the walk starting at 10 a.m.

“An event with multiple pillars to it,” Aaron Zook of Walk to End Alzheimer’s said. “The walk really is a year-round awareness event that is meant to bring 46 years of research, best practices, information, resources, support that have been developed through the Alzheimer’s Association into the hands of the people whose lives it will impact the most.”

Zook said the goal is to get this information to people directly impacted by Alzheimer’s as well as primary care workers. Additionally, the walk serves as a way to highlight the work people are doing to fight against the brain disorder.

The organization is halfway to its goal of $91,000 raised. Registration and donations can also be made online at act.alz.org after going to the New Richmond walk’s page.

“We refer to it many times as the world’s largest support group,” Zook said. “It’s kind of amazing. As someone who's regular nine to five is dealing with all these different aspects of the work that we do, when it comes to that point on Saturday morning when you’re seeing these individuals, these families come together; it is incredibly moving. Our walks generally have almost like a county fair atmosphere that starts at around 8:30 in the morning, and then at 9:30 we have a ceremony that includes some new information [regarding the recent disease research.]”

Zook said setting up the event can be tiring, but after seeing everyone connect with each other during the walk, the second, third and fourth wind comes.

The Alzheimer’s Association is approaching 50 years, and the research has come a long way.

“In the last, really 15 months, things have moved quite a bit,” Zook said. “About seven or eight years ago, we had our first treatment approved by the FDA. It’s a treatment that a person has to be diagnosed relatively early in the development of the disease, and the treatment is a blood transfusion, which is obviously really expensive. It’s really painful. It’s really difficult. To make matters worse, in Wisconsin, there were really only two places where you could get that transfusion.”

Those who needed the transfusion had to relocate their lives to Madison or Milwaukee and wait for a slot to open up. During the last 15 months, an injectable maintenance dose was approved. What that means is if a person had no issues for 18 months with the transfusion, they can take a shot once or twice per week at home or with their primary doctor. In the best-case scenario, growth of the disease was stunted by 95%, slowing the timeline down by 10 years.

“The fact that we got this injectable form approved last year was huge,” Zook said.

That was not all, though. A blood test diagnostic was also approved, which is a blood draw from a primary doctor that checks for protein in your blood that builds up in the brain in a way that it’s not supposed to. Zook said anyone over the age of 55, no matter where they are, should have the ability to request this test from their doctor. The diagnosis process used to involve a spinal tap, so Zook said many cases of Alzheimer’s are now stopped before they can fully develop.

“It’s more than 93% effective in positive and negative cases,” Zook said. “That was a huge thing last year to have those two things approved at once.”

This summer, the injectable dose was approved as a "maintenance dose,” which means people can take the injectable dose preventatively if there are early signs of potential Alzheimer’s, rather than waiting until the Alzheimer’s has already developed.

“You don’t have to spend or raise any money to be a part of the walk,” Zook said. “We’re at a point where the more people we can get connected to our local walks, the more impact we can have culturally, the more impact we can have politically and the more we can keep up this incredible momentum.”

There will be a pasta luncheon on Grandparents Day at 11:30 a.m. Sept. 13 at Ezekiel Lutheran Church in River Falls where free will donations will be accepted to support the walk. On Aug. 9, there was a fundraiser brunch at the River Falls Moose Lodge that also benefitted the walk.