LAB TEAM ON

QUEST FOR DRUG BREAKTHROUGH

- BY EMMELINE SAUNDERS

Pioneering doctors working on the front line of research into dementia have hope there will be a cure in our lifetime, thanks to their groundbreaking studies.

Fawlty Towers legend Prunella Scales, who died this week, was one of around one million people in the UK and Ireland affected by dementia, with Alzheimer's disease being the biggest cause.

But it is not a normal part of ageing, despite its prevalence in the elderly population, something neuroscientist Dr Cara Croft is keen to stress.

A scientist at the Queen Mary University of London's Blizard Institute, she is working relentlessly to find effective treatments.

She says: "Dementia and the diseases that cause dementia are a massive problem to society. At one point, I was thinking of becoming a clinical doctor, but I didn't want to say to patients, 'Sorry, you've got a disease that causes dementia but there's not really anything we can do for you'.

"Going down the science route instead, I feel that we can make waves and not have patients worry they only have so many more years left of normality.

"I wouldn't be researching Alzheimer's if I didn't believe we can find treatments to slow, cure or prevent this disease in our lifetimes."