Ep07: Roche's Approach to Brain Health: Insights From the World Economic Forum's Brain Health Impact Session

[00:00:04] Dan Kendall: Welcome to the Brain Health News Podcast, part of Health UNMUTED. This podcast series was created by Mission Based Media in association with the Davos Alzheimer's Collaborative. 

This is our final episode of the recordings that were made at the 2024 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting. 

However, we plan to update this podcast series with more news about brain health, as it unfolds. Plus, we have other great content available for you on our website at healthunmuted.com. 

On that website, you can find audio mini series specifically around Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and other health conditions and topics. 

Be sure to hit the follow button on this podcast on your podcast player, and subscribe to our newsletter for updates, you can do that at healthunmuted.com. 

And lastly, if you'd like to get in touch directly, please drop us a line at [email protected]. 

I'm Dan Kendall, founder of Mission Based Media and managing editor of Health UNMUTED. Thank you for your support and interest in this important topic. Now let's jump into the conversation with host Drew Holzapfel.  

[00:01:09] Drew Holzapfel: Good afternoon, my name is Drew Holzapfel. I'm the chief operating officer of the Davos Alzheimer's Collaborative. I'm here at the World Economic Forum for brain health impact session. I'm joined today by Sasha Bozeat and Mikele Epperly, two of the leaders at Roche. 

 I'm excited to have this conversation with you both. Sasha, I'll start with you. 

What does Roche see is the value of the Davos Alzheimer's Collaborative? 

[00:01:32] Sasha Bozeat: As you know, we've been members of the Davos Alzheimer's Collaborative since its inception and we're really big supporters of the breadth of the initiatives, which you guys are carrying out, which we see as being very impactful for the AD community. I think one aspect I'd like to highlight particularly is the health care system preparedness work, which is particularly relevant for us as a diagnostics company developing biomarkers.

Obviously, the development of a biomarker, an accurate biomarker is just the first step, but implementing interclinical routine throws up all sorts of challenges that you're not necessarily able to predict when you're developing these biomarkers. And one thing that's been fantastic is the flagship program where you have actually put biomarkers into clinical practice in various different countries across the world.

And that really unearths a lot of learnings, that you can then share with the rest of the community. And it's really helpful for us to understand what the barriers are to implementation of biomarkers and also to be able to feed those learnings back into our development program so that when we're developing novel biomarkers, we are developing biomarkers that are not only accurate, but they also appropriate and fit for clinical practice.

[00:02:45] Drew Holzapfel: That's great. I really appreciate the fact that you called out the implementation of these diagnostics. It's really like a last mile problem, right? The science has been done and now they need to benefit the patients. So thank you again. The Davos Alzheimer's Collaborative, since you guys were here on day one, has been able to generate about 60 million dollars in funding that we've been able to push out into about 135 projects. So thank you for your help.

So now my other favorite Roche expert, we're going to turn to Mikele here and I'd like to just understand something because I know your focus at Roche is on brain health. And so tell me how Roche sees brain health and how is it different than Alzheimer's? 

[00:03:22] Mikele Epperly: It is different. We're both working towards the same North Star, which for Roche and neuroscience is preserving what makes people who they are. But, the programs are a little different, in that brain health focuses across the lifespan. So it also includes early development, childhood, and it also looks beyond pharmacological interventions and diagnostics to also lifestyle modifications and prevention.

We think about how brain health can help support the Alzheimer's and other disease area strategies. And then, of course, early detection and diagnosis in Alzheimer's help support the brain health objectives as well. 

[00:03:59] Drew Holzapfel: That's fantastic. It really does make sense, it's a holistic approach at the issue. So when we go from brain health to thinking about brain illness, what do we know about the impact of brain illness, and what can we do about it? 

[00:04:14] Mikele Epperly: One of the statistics that resonates most with me, is that the rate of brain disorders is increasing faster than the population is increasing and our health systems are unprepared for that. So I think what we can do is work on policy, advocacy, legislation and health system preparedness.

So I would pile on to what Sasha said and really thank DAC for their work leading in this space and hope it continues beyond Alzheimer's to other neurological conditions as well. 

[00:04:42] Drew Holzapfel: So we were here for a roundtable on brain health. This is the brain health impact studio. What's a big idea for DAC and Roche and any other partner on how we can improve brain health globally.

[00:04:53] Mikele Epperly: Big idea, I don't know, but maybe next step. We're already partnering together and really appreciate your leadership in helping think through early detection, diagnosis and health care delivery. But what about tackling those risk factors and lifestyle modifications? Maybe that's something that we could do together next.

[00:05:14] Drew Holzapfel: That's a fantastic idea and we're a willing partner. So I just want to ask you both one final question. This has been referred to as the golden age of neuroscience. Do you share that level of optimism and why? 

[00:05:27] Sasha Bozeat: Absolutely. When I think about where we are with brain health now, it's some years since we discovered that around 40 percent of cases of dementia could probably be prevented by modifying risk factors.

And we're now starting to grow the evidence and really understand the impact of the individual risk factors, which is important because if you want to be able to give advice to people, it's going to need to be tailored to the individual. We need to think about what are those individual risk factors that are relevant for them and give advice on how they can modify those. 

I think we think a lot about diet and exercise, which of course is both very important. But hearing loss, for example, has now in a recent study been shown to be found to be the most significant modifiable risk factor that there is actually.

And hearing loss in midlife is something which is relatively easy in most cases to treat. Hearing aids may be seen as something that's a little bit easier to implement than maybe changing your diet or introducing a new exercise regime. I'm very optimistic really, that we start to uncover and really understand what the different elements of brain health and what individuals can do to modify their risk and keep their brain healthy.

[00:06:41] Drew Holzapfel: Do you share the optimism, Mikele? 

[00:06:43] Mikele Epperly: Yeah, I really feel like the neurological revolution is here. You know, if you look at disease areas like cancer so much seems to be known there compared to neuroscience, which feels much more risky from a pharmaceutical perspective, because there's so much less known from a clinical perspective, and yet our knowledge is advancing rapidly. And we've now got treatment in the Alzheimer's space, and I see that continuing to grow exponentially. And I'm getting really excited when we have roundtables like we did today, where you get all the minds together and you start thinking about what's possible. And now we need to take it to, then what do we do? 

[00:07:23] Drew Holzapfel: It's a great point to end on, because we did walk out that roundtable where there were many different representatives from public private sector, philanthropy, and there is a level of optimism. So, we wouldn't be here without you guys. So we appreciate your commitment, your time today and your commitment moving forward. Thank you very much.

[00:07:39] Mikele Epperly: Thank you. 

[00:07:40] Sasha Bozeat: Thank you.

[00:07:42] Dan Kendall: Thanks again for tuning into the Brain Health News Podcast. Be sure to visit healthunmuted.com for more information about brain health. And if you'd like to get in touch with us directly, please drop us a line at [email protected]. Please also visit www.davosalzheimerscollaborative.org for more information about the work they're doing to promote brain health and end Alzheimer's globally.