What are Advanced Therapies?
Advanced Therapies are specialized treatments designed for people living with movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease, Essential Tremor, and Dystonia. When medications are no longer providing adequate relief from symptoms, advanced therapies can offer another option to maintain or improve a person's quality of life.
These therapies include:
- Deep brain stimulation (DBS)
- High-intensity focused ultrasound
- Carbidopa/levodopa infusion therapies
These treatments can restore independence, improve mobility, and improve quality of life for patients with increasingly complex symptoms.
Why Are Advanced Therapies Important?
Movement disorders can significantly impact a person's ability to work, engage with friends and family, and maintain independence. As these diseases progress, many patients reach a point where traditional medication management is no longer enough. Advanced therapies provide additional treatment options that can help manage symptoms more effectively.
For many patients, advanced therapies are not simply new treatments. They are life-changing interventions that restore confidence, increase independence, and create opportunities to participate more fully in everyday life.
Why The University of Colorado?
The University of Colorado Advanced Therapies for Movement Disorders (CUATMD) program is set apart by its multidisciplinary care. Every patient is evaluated by a team working together to identify the most effective treatment strategy. The evaluation process for advanced therapies is highly specialized and requires collaboration among neurologists, neurosurgeons, neuropsychiatrists, rehabilitation specialists, palliative care experts, nurses, and advanced practice providers.
Research is a core component of the CUATMD program. As a regional leader in advanced therapies, the CUATMD team is continuously evaluating the safety, effectiveness, and long-term outcomes of treatments. Researchers are also committed to developing innovative tools, optimising treatment delivery, and improving quality of life for people living with movement disorders.
The program also helps shape the future of movement disorders care through a unique, six-month Advanced Therapies curriculum for second-year movement disorders fellows. This intensive training experience prepares fellows to become experts in advanced therapies by teaching them how to identify appropriate candidates for treatment, understand the evaluation and decision-making process, and develop expertise in therapies such as deep brain stimulation, focused ultrasound, and infusion therapies. By the completion of the program, fellows are equipped not only to recognize when patients should be referred for advanced therapies, but also to establish and lead advanced therapy practices within their own institutions and communities.
How Does Philanthropy Support CUATMD?
Philanthropic Support plays a vital role in accelerating innovation and expanding access to advanced therapies. While many groundbreaking ideas begin in the clinic, they often require early-stage funding to develop new approaches, evaluate outcomes, and bring promising innovations to patients more quickly.
Donor support can help:
- Train future leaders. Philanthropic support helps sustain our innovative six-month Advanced Therapies curriculum for second-year movement disorders fellows, ensuring future specialists are trained to deliver and expand access to advanced therapies in communities across the country. This investment in education creates a lasting impact that extends far beyond a single patient or institution.
- Advance research and innovation. Philanthropic support helps researchers evaluate emerging therapies, improve patient outcomes, and develop new approaches to treating movement disorders. Donor-funded research accelerates discoveries, generates critical preliminary data for larger grants, and helps bring the next generation of advanced therapies to patients faster.
- Amplifying research impact. Philanthropic support enables investigators and trainees to present research at scientific meetings and publish their findings in peer-reviewed journals. Sharing discoveries with the broader medical community accelerates innovation, improves patient care, and extends the impact of CUATMD's research far beyond Colorado.
Snippet of Accomplishments
- There Is an Effective Surgical Treatment for Parkinson's. Why Aren't More Women with the Disease Getting It? Read the story.
- Reducing Essential Tremor: CU Anschutz Doctors Perform 100th High-Intensity Focused Ultrasound. Read the story.
- Patient pioneers an innovative adaptive brain stimulation device for Parkinson's. Read the story.
- CU First to Offer New Deep Brain Stimulation Treatment for Parkinson's Disease Patients. Read the story.
- Parkinson's patient finds hope in computerized advances to brain stimulation treatment. Read the story.
- HIFU treatment: Focused ultrasound helps treat debilitating essential tremor. Read the story.
- Vyalev pump eases 'off' periods for advanced Parkinson's patients. Read the story.
- Remote deep-brain stimulation programming saves "money and miles" for patient with Parkinson's disease. Read the story.
How to Donate
- Click the Give Now button below.
- Select or type in the amount you wish to donate.
- If you would like to give a gift every month in the amount you selected, check the box next to Make this a monthly recurring gift!
- Under Gift Designation, select the dropdown arrow in the box and choose Write in where you would like to direct your gift.
- The dropdown box turns into a text box. Click inside the box and Type over the text type the fund you would like to support goes away. Type one of the following
- Movement Disorders Gift Fund
- Advanced Therapy for Movement Disorders
- Fill in the rest of the personal information on the form.
- Select your type of payment and complete the payment process.
Give now
To make a gift over the phone using your credit card, please call the number below and a CU Foundation representative will be happy to accept and process your gift.
Phone: 303-541-1290
Hours: Monday-Friday, 9am-4pm MT