Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center

12/27/2022

Each year, we share highlights of our patient-centered research, news about our scientists, core laboratory services, and our many collaborations at the Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center. Thank you for taking an interest in our work. As always, we welcome your inquiries, comments, and suggestions and invite you to stay in touch with our progress on the developments that matter most to you.

Click here to read the full newsletter! https://www.bnac.net/news/2022-annual-bnac-newsletter

12/19/2022

The deadline to raise $100,000 for the CASA-MS progressive MS study is just 13 days away!

Please help these 2 people and a cat meet their goals! Your gifts will be matched by the Annette Funicello Fund.

https://crowdfunding.buffalo.edu/project/31592

https://crowdfunding.buffalo.edu/project/30899

Help University at Buffalo raise $5,000 for the project: Mitch Sturgeon. Your gift will make a difference!

11/17/2022

Smart. Creative. Indefatigable. Optimist. There certainly are more ways to describe BNAC’s long-time friend and fundraising consultant, Linda J. Safran. Yet none may be more descriptive than commitment.

Linda’s own turn at living with multiple sclerosis began many years ago. So, it was with characteristic enthusiasm and unrelenting creativity and energy that she began to apply her decades of fundraising expertise to the cause of advancing research and knowledge to help others living with the disease. She found the perfect platform in service to the Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center in her hometown of Buffalo, NY, when she initially volunteered as a clinical trial participant in a patient-centered, investigator-initiated study back in 2009.

In 2011, Linda’s dream of incorporating the perspectives of people with MS into the research process began to become real with the creation of the BNAC Advisory Council.

Council chair Larry Montani credits Linda with the inspiration for the Council and marvels at her infectious energy. “As the Council has matured and found its place alongside Dr. Zivadinov and his team of talented researchers, much credit for our strong patient-centered focus goes to Linda,” said Montani.

“Linda is one-of-a-kind,” said BNAC Center Director Robert Zivadinov, MD, PhD. “There is no one with more energy, more ideas, and a greater desire to help people with MS. We have been blessed to have her as an integral part of our team.”

As the first phase of a private fundraising campaign in support of BNAC’s investigator-initiated CASA-MS study draws to a close, Linda will step back from BNAC’s day-to-day fundraising leadership, and remains an important and unyielding patient advocate, liaison to the Advisory Council, and one of BNAC’s most notable friends.

Read more about Linda and her accomplishments for people with MS and BNAC here: https://www.bnac.net/news/linda-j-safran-cfre-marks-14-years-of-extraordinary-service-to-bnac-and-people-with-ms

11/14/2022

For people with multiple sclerosis (MS), hearing a doctor tell them they are experiencing brain atrophy—an important, predictive biomarker of MS disease progression—can trigger debilitating fear and anxiety.

Now a team of University at Buffalo researchers, working alongside people with MS and their advocates, has analyzed the problem and developed solutions that can open the door to better patient understanding and potentially, better self-care. The paper was published online in The Journal of Neurology on Nov. 14, 2022.

Entitled, “Communicating the Relevance of Neurodegeneration and Brain Atrophy to Multiple Sclerosis Patients: Patient, Provider and Researcher Perspectives,” the paper describes how clinicians can best communicate highly sensitive and technical information about an individual’s MS disease progression.

The research grew out of a novel collaboration between BNAC researchers and the center’s Advisory Council, a sophisticated group of individuals whose mission is to provide a patient’s perspective to the center’s internationally known team of neuroimaging researchers. Center Director Robert Zivadinov, MD, PhD, and his colleagues at BNAC have published some of the landmark studies identifying brain atrophy as a key biomarker for MS disease progression.

“Our goal is to minimize misunderstanding and apprehension about brain atrophy, also known as brain volume loss, which can seem so devastating it can affect patients akin to how a cancer diagnosis would,” said Penny Pennington, a lead author on the paper and co-chair the Advisory Council’s Research and Education Committee. She has lived with MS for over 40 years.

Click here for more about the team’s recommendations to guide clinicians and a link to the abstract: https://www.bnac.net/news/ms-clinicians-listen-up-here-s-how-your-patients-need-you-to-talk-about-brain-atrophy

Visit the BNAC website for more about its patient-centered research and its Advisory Council: https://www.bnac.net/advisory-council

08/29/2022

BNAC researchers and students join in celebrating the life and work of the late Lawrence Jacobs, BNAC founder and a brilliant and visionary biomedical researcher whose research changed forever how multiple sclerosis was treated around the world.

Last month, officials of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society (NMSS), three generations of the Jacobs family, former patients, fellow researchers, and friends gathered for a tribute at University at Buffalo’s Clinical and Translational Research Center.

The purpose: pay homage to the man known by patients, friends, and colleagues as Dr. Larry and to recognize how his work decades ago laid the foundation for “Pathways to Cures” of the NMSS, the society’s 2022 roadmap for new MS treatments and cures published recently in the Multiple Sclerosis Journal.

Penny L. Pennington, Director of Program Management for the Jacobs MS Center for Treatment and Research, and a long-time member and former Chair of the BNAC Advisory Council was instrumental in initiating the event. Penny continues to be a leading voice for MS equity and patient-centered research at BNAC and beyond.

Read the full story here: https://www.buffalo.edu/ubnow/stories/2022/07/jacobs-tribute.html

Read “Pathways to Cures for Multiple Sclerosis: a Research Roadmap: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/13524585221075990

07/07/2022

Lisa Emrich, a strong patient advocate, accomplished speaker, and award-winning author, has joined the Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center Advisory Council.

The BNAC Advisory Council was formed in the spring of 2011 to provide guidance in addressing current challenges in neurological research, to help clarify directions for new research, and to provide education for those outside the neurological community about what BNAC’s research means to the understanding of multiple sclerosis and other neurological diseases.

Read more about Lisa and her passion for advancing patient-focused and participant-driven research, and meet the full Advisory Council on our website.

Read more about Lisa: https://www.bnac.net/directory/advisory/profile/lisa-emrich

Read more the Advisory Council: https://www.bnac.net/advisory-council

07/06/2022

Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center (BNAC) director and University at Buffalo Professor of Neurology Robert Zivadinov, MD, PhD, is among six UB faculty honored as recipients of the 2022 State University of New York Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities. The SUNY system-wide Chancellor’s Awards recognize “consistently superior professional achievement and the ongoing pursuit of excellence” and the award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities specifically recognizes “those who engage actively in scholarly and creative pursuits beyond their teaching responsibilities.”

Read more: https://www.bnac.net/news/robert-zivadinov-md-phd-is-honored-as-recipient-of-the-2022-state-university-of-new-york-chancellor-s-award-for-excellence-in-sc

05/17/2022

BNAC is honored and grateful for growing financial support that will be matched by a $100,000 challenge grant from The Annette Funicello Research Fund for Neurological Diseases for the center’s groundbreaking Comprehensive Assessment of Severely Affected Multiple Sclerosis (CASA-MS) progressive multiple sclerosis study.

BNAC researchers believe the study will lead to a better understanding of why mild and moderate progressive MS becomes severely advanced for some people but not so for others. The study will compare people with advanced MS with others who have had MS for the same number of years but who have less disability. The findings could point to ways to improve the quality of life for those with severe MS and relief for their caregivers. It will also bring important new insight into what differentiates people whose progression is milder from those who need 24-hour care.

BNAC’s CASA-MS study is being conducted in collaboration with The Boston Home, a facility specializing in care for people with advanced stage MS and other progressive neurological disorders, and with UB’s Jacobs Multiple Sclerosis Center for Treatment and Research.

Donations received by Dec. 31, 2022 will be matched by Funicello grant and will help reach the $1 million overall goal to underwrite this multi-year, investigator-initiated study.
For the full story of the Funicello foundation’s grant, go to https://www.bnac.net/news/bnac-seeking-to-match-100-000-challenge-grant-for-study-of-advanced-ms-from-annette-funicello-research-fund-for-neurological-dis

To donate now to the Annette’s Fund Challenge, go to https://crowdfunding.buffalo.edu/project/29733

04/22/2022

See the story on WKBW, Buffalo's ABC TV affiliate: https://www.wkbw.com/lifestyle/health/ub-to-study-why-some-ms-patients-experience-severity-of-disease

And read the feature in The Buffalo News: https://buffalonews.com/news/local/ms-researchers-in-buffalo-and-boston-join-forces-to-understand-the-most-severe-and-humbling/article_b45ae508-bf5f-11ec-95cb-37dfc73c693d.html -source=home-top-story

04/21/2022

Today in The Buffalo News, reporter Scott Scanlon tells the story of CASA-MS – the Comprehensive Assessment of Severely Affected Multiple Sclerosis study, its inspiration, and its amazing participants.

This first-of-its-kind study is exploring the question that haunts MS patients as soon as they are diagnosed: Am I going to become severely disabled by my disease?

The project, conducted by researchers at the Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center, will identify imaging, clinical and laboratory features, and risk factors that can lead to an earlier recognition of severe MS or predict transition to severe MS,” says Ralph H. B. Benedict, professor of neurology at the Jacobs School and a CASA-MS co-principal investigator. “It will develop more sensitive outcome measures to better monitor disease progression and will try to develop a better understanding of how protected, enriched environments can contribute to patient health.”

Read the story in The Buffalo News:
https://buffalonews.com/news/local/ms-researchers-in-buffalo-and-boston-join-forces-to-understand-the-most-severe-and-humbling/article_b45ae508-bf5f-11ec-95cb-37dfc73c693d.html -source=home-top-story

Read more about study and how you can contribute here. https://www.bnac.net/casa-ms

04/11/2022

BNAC STUDENT ASSERTS PATIENT PERSPECTIVE IN BOSTON GLOBE STORY ON “TIK TOK TICS”

BNAC’s Clinical Trial Research Assistant and Project Manager Devon Oship, contributes the perspective of a neurology student and a Tourettic woman in this recent Boston Globe feature that asks the question, “Are young women catching ‘TikTok tics’ from social media? The answer is complex.”

Devon’s advocacy, stretches back to her elementary school years. At age 11, she was featured in an ABC 20/20 documentary about Tourette. She has been working as a science and civil rights educator ever since, with a special focus on support for women and girls affected by Tourette syndrome. Her passion and contributions mirror BNAC’s longstanding commitment to patient-centered research. The research community must continue to challenge assumptions and funding dynamics that obscure or ignore the experience of all patients and people directly affected by disorders and disease.

BNAC’s Advisory Council, consisting of people with or directly affected by multiple sclerosis, represents the voice of patients across our work with MS.
Here is the Globe story, including Devon’s insights.

What a mysterious illness, sometimes linked to viral videos on social media, tells us about whose suffering counts as real.

04/08/2022

At the American Academy of Neurology Annual Meeting this week, Clinical Research Director Dejan Jakimovski, MD, PhD, presented findings of a recent study, conducted with BNAC colleagues Drs. Niels Bergsland and Michael Dwyer, that explored the correlation between blood flow to the brain and neuronal damage associated with multiple sclerosis. In an interview with the editors of NeurologyLive®, Jakimovski explains how the study builds on BNAC’s earlier research establishing that people with MS who have lower cerebral arterial blood flow, or CABF, have worse cognitive performance. The new study shows, using a measurable biomarker of neuronal damage, that diminished blood flow is contributing to the destruction of more axons in the brain.

The study may be the first to establish the link between cerebral arterial blood flow (CABF) and serum neurofilament light chain (sNfL), a biomarker of neuronal damage.

Read the full interview on NeurologyLive® here: https://www.neurologylive.com/view/understanding-relationship-between-cerebral-arterial-blood-flow-and-serum-neurofilament-light-ms

For more about research by Dr. Jakimovski and his colleagues at Buffalo Neuroimaging Analysis Center, visit https://www.bnac.net/news