Overview
The Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health’s clinical research program is among the largest in the country for Alzheimer’s disease. We have conducted more than 100 studies in Huntington’s and Parkinson’s disease, MS, Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal and Lewy body dementia, memory decline and normal cognition. Additionally, we offer investigator-led studies, including a study of repeated head trauma in active and retired professional fighters.
Hollywood often portrays research as a dramatic “Eureka!” moment when a single scientist working in his lab jumps to his feet, bubbling test tube in hand, and announces he has found a miracle cure. In real life, research is far more complex, yielding results after years, not moments, of investigation. The cornerstone is clinical trials, the only route to advance new drug therapies.
Almost every staff member at Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health is involved in conducting clinical research. These trials generate the only type of data acceptable to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) when it considers which treatments to approve for people with brain disorders.
Global reach
Neuroscience research does not occur in a vacuum. Our center takes part in multidisciplinary, multisite trials sponsored by multiple stakeholders, including pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology companies, and independent foundations and donors.
We also engage with and lead important national and international neuroscience networks, among them the NIH’s Alzheimer’s Disease Research Centers, Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI), the Global Alzheimer’s Platform (GAP) and the Parkinson’s Study Group (PSG). Due in part to our focus on research, our center is:
- An exploratory Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center.
- Lewy Body Dementia Association Research Center of Excellence.
- Parkinson’s Foundation Center of Excellence.
- CurePSP Center of Care.
- National Multiple Sclerosis Society Partner in MS Care.
- Participating in national research consortia including ADNI, ALLFTD, DIAGNOSE CTE, and Michael J. Fox Foundation PPMI.
All we need is you
Patients are the vital link in research. When you participate in a clinical research study, you become a citizen scientist, making important contributions toward identifying new therapies to help yourself and countless others who may be affected.
You can also help by supporting our impact at Cleveland Clinic Nevada. Research is very expensive and your donation, no matter the size, can help our center fulfill its mandate to investigate the next generation of drug therapies for brain disease.
Participate in Clinical Research
What are clinical trials?
Clinical trials are one of the cornerstones to advances in therapy. The most cutting-edge and promising therapies are tested in a safe, comfortable and ethical manner.
Patients have the opportunity to participate in these advancements and to participate in new therapies before they become commercially available. A clinical trial consortium links our Cleveland, Florida and Nevada sites to ensure that patients have access to clinical trials regardless of where they are treated.
There are many types of clinical trials spanning treatment, diagnosis, prevention, screening, observation and quality of life. Clinical trials are a required step toward FDA approval of new drugs, and thus are the only way to find new treatments or a cure for brain disease.
We’re looking for people who represent the rich diversity of our Nevada communities. You can help.Why Should I Get Involved?
- To contribute to the effort of finding more effective treatments for neurological disease.
- To gain access to potential treatments before they are widely available.
How do I participate in a clinical research study?
Your participation in clinical research could make a difference for your family and your community. We offer opportunities to participate in research regardless of where you receive neurological care. Some research studies need healthy volunteers, too.
View open clinical trials online or contact us by phone at 702.701.7944 or by email at healthybrains@ccf.org to with questions.
Are you ready to join a study? Please tell us more about you so we can find a study right for you!
Research for Alzheimer's Disease (NVeADRC)
In September 2020, the National Institute on Aging (NIA) at The National Institutes of Health awarded Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health $3.3 million to establish The Nevada exploratory Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center (NVeADRC).
We are among the first cohort of centers nationally to receive this exploratory award and hold the distinction as the first and only NIA-funded Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center in Nevada. The NVeADRC will help meet a great need here in our state as well as in the scientific community by focusing on disparities faced by individuals with dementia in rural settings.
Leveraging our geographic status as a Frontier State, the NVeADRC will develop novel methodologies and technology to enroll patients from rural communities throughout Nevada into a cohort and collect high-quality data to advance the mission of the ADRC Program.
The three-year award is the first of its kind to be presented as part of the NIH’s prestigious Alzheimer’s Disease Research Centers Program – a national network of researchers and clinicians at major medical institutions pursuing improved diagnosis and care for people with Alzheimer’s disease.
For more information on the NVeADRC, contact our research team at healthybrains@ccf.org or visit the study’s website.
Prevention
Peer-reviewed research indicates that up to 40% of Alzheimer’s cases could be prevented through brain-healthy lifestyle modifications such as nutrition, physical and mental activity. When Cleveland Clinic Nevada opened in 2009, the idea that we could prevent brain disease didn’t exist.
Today, we’re addressing prevention both by investigating potential new treatments to prevent the onset of disease as well as recommending risk-reduction strategies:
- HealthyBrains.org: Based on six pillars of brain health, HealthyBrains.org arms individuals with the tools they need to take a proactive approach to brain health, including a free brain health self-assessment, personalized reports with customized recommendations, brain health news and information on participating in clinical research.
- Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement Prevention Center at Cleveland Clinic: The nation’s first women-specific center for clinical Alzheimer’s disease prevention, the Women’s Alzheimer’s Prevention Center arms women with risk-reduction tactics aimed at the 40% of Alzheimer’s cases that are preventable, taking into account factors unique to women such as menopause, and those that can impact their brains more than men’s, like diabetes. The goal is prevention; the means is risk-reduction.
Innovations
Brain health research programs in Las Vegas
Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health is dedicated to better understanding of brain diseases and the development of more effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia, Lewy body dementia and mild cognitive impairment; Parkinson’s and Huntington’s disease and other movement disorders; and multiple sclerosis.
The center participates in several research studies and clinical trials to advance new treatments and diagnostic approaches for patients, including repurposing drugs approved for other conditions to treat neurodegenerative disorders, leveraging imaging techniques such as MRI, investigating physical activity to slow the advance of disease, and using bioinformatics and clinical data to understand dementia, neuroinflammation, and repetitive head trauma.
Choose a research program
- Alzheimer’s Disease: Repurposed Agents.
- Dementia with Lewy Bodies.
- Neurodegenerative Diseases: Las Vegas Clinical Trials.
- Neurodegenerative Diseases: Advancing Neuroimaging Techniques.
- Repetitive Head Trauma: Effects in Football and Professional Combat Sports.
- Dementia: Integrating Cognition, Imaging, and Modern Data Science.
Contact our research team
Phone: 702.701.7944
Email: Email the Las Vegas research team
