When Laura Wieden was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis at age 24, she had college behind her and the whole world ahead of her. She was looking forward to marriage, career and family. Instead she found out that life is under no obligation to give you what you expect.
She learned to live with her disease, a condition in which rogue white blood cells attack the brain and spinal cord, eventually affecting balance and motor control. She bought a cane, asked for help from strangers, and found support in family and friends. It was never an option to give up hope or faith in her future.
Today the best hope for Laura’s future involves researchers’ belief that they may be able to teach the brain to regrow damaged areas, an approach that experts think will lead to cures for MS and for other neurological conditions. This is the most exciting and promising area of brain science.
OHSU's new center for neurosciences research, the Jungers Center, is housed in the new biomedical research building. Three floors down is the Advanced Imaging Research Center, where scientists can access the most powerful imaging equipment in the world to better understand the effect of new therapies on the brain. Two floors up is a chemical biology laboratory, where scientists and biologists will together uncover the chemical mechanisms that can help the brain heal itself.
For Laura and her family, who recently endowed a fund to support innovative MS research at OHSU, that’s a bright future that can’t come soon enough.
