[vc_row][vc_column][vc_custom_heading text=”MAIN LESSONS FROM THE 2021 CDKL5 FORUM” font_container=”tag:h1|text_align:left” use_theme_fonts=”yes” css=”.vc_custom_1636390226443{padding-top: 15px !important;padding-bottom: 15px !important;}”][vc_column_text]
For the past seven years, the Loulou Foundation has hosted an annual meeting, the CDKL5 Forum, where scientists and drug developers working on CDKL5 Deficiency Disorder (CDD), together with representatives from patient organizations, meet to discuss the latest advances in the field. You can find written summaries from the past three meetings here: 2018, 2019 and 2020.
The 2021 CDKL5 Forum edition took place November 1-2, and for the second year, due to the ongoing pandemic, it was held fully on-line. The Loulou Foundation turned this into an opportunity to also host a series of workshops prior to the 2-day conference, turning the Forum into a giant Think Tank. This made this year’s Forum quite unique, and I hope the pre-conference workshops are here to stay.
I know that many in the CDD patient community are waiting for this written summary, so I will try to extract the main conclusions from the Forum with this audience in mind. But I want to start with a warning: if you are reading this summary mainly looking for an answer to “when are the gene therapy trials for CDD starting?”, the best answer that we have today is “we don’t know yet”. I understand this might feel disappointing to some, as if we are not progressing fast enough, and potentially make you feel a bit hopeless. That’s only human, so I want to acknowledge that upfront.
In the next paragraphs I will walk you through the magnitude of the effort and the tangible progress that has taken place around research and treatments for CDD, and that was presented at the Forum. I invite you to read it in the spirit of celebrating each step and each progress and small victory along the way, because we have come a very long way, and this year the progress in biology understanding and therapy development has been particularly significant.
It is remarkable how far we’ve come in the last few years, and the size and commitment of the community of scientists and companies that has grown around CDD.
Because of that, I have structured the summary of this year’s Forum around the following themes: hope, tangible progresses, strategy and partnerships.
Please use the following link to read more….[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]