Make a DonationOur Research Strategy:
- Collect de-identified data from our CreatineInfo Patient Registry
- Collaborate with researchers academic or industry to support basic, translational, and clinical research for all three CCDS.
- Fund research through grants and fellowships.
- Follow a rigorous Financial Conflict of Interest policy.
- Enable access to development tools (biosamples, mouse models, etc.)
- Act as a liaison for connecting various domain experts (academic or industry) to speed up progress.
- Organize scientific meetings (see Virtual Conference 2020).
- Educate our families on science and research topics relevant to CCDS (see quarterly Creatine Decoded essays)
- In March 2021 we awarded 115k towards CCDS research for three ACD Fellowships and a sponsored project
Our Five Year Vision:
Invest $5 million in CCDS research with the aim of having 5 Investigational New Drugs (INDs) for creatine deficiencies in progress with the FDA by 2026;
INDs can translate into clinical trials and into treatments for CTD and better treatments for GAMT. We will collaborate, support, fund, and drive research to make this happen.
How will your donation make wishes come true? In 2023 we plan to:
- Award fellowships to expand our research network and bring in the best researchers to work with us on finding treatments for creatine deficiencies
- Fund and advance projects that will screen and identify repurposable drugs to treat CCDS
- Expand and continue advancing gene therapy research by funding the CCDS Gene Therapy Consortium and the Gene Therapy Advancement grants
- Advance our newborn screening efforts for CTD and GAMT and find more currently undiagnosed and future newborn CCDS patients through widespread and targeted outreach
- Study the relationship between GAA/Ornithine to seizures in GAMT to enable therapeutic development
- Grow the CreatineInfo patient registry and support the longitudinal natural history study in preparation for clinical trials
Current Projects and Collaborations:
CCDS Gene Therapy Consortium
Gene therapy is an exciting research area that holds the promise for treatments in many rare diseases. Both Creatine Transporter Deficiency and GAMT deficiency are monogenic conditions which makes them, in theory, good candidates for gene therapy. However, gene therapy efforts often require large financial investments and long timelines. As a first step, in 2019, ACD ran a fundraising campaign to fund the advancement of gene therapy for CCDS. With $50,000 raised by parents and families to be used towards gene therapy research efforts, the ACD started CCDS Gene Therapy Consortium. The mission of the consortium is to facilitate the timely sharing of information and development tools among the several labs that are pursuing gene therapies for creatine deficiencies. We believe that by building a collaborative environment and supporting through small grants shareable tools we can shorten the timeline and effort required to find gene therapy solutions for creatine deficiencies. For more updates click here.
AGAT-Inhibitors Drug Development Research Project
Principal Investigator Dr. Nicola Longo, University of Utah
The ACD is pleased to announce their support of Dr. Nicola Longo in his research into new treatments and therapies for Guanidinoacetate Methyltransferase (GAMT) Deficiency. $25,000 of the funds raised from Holiday Heroes 2020 have been dedicated to this research initiative. Presently, treatment for GAMT patients involves supplementing creatine and l-ornithine orally (between 400 and 800 mg/kg per day), an arginine-restricted diet with or without medical food, and sodium benzoate (100 mg/kg per day) to reduce the concentration of guanidinoacetate. Even with the best available therapy, the concentration of guanidinoacetate remains elevated above normal. The toxicity of guanidinoacetate is the likely cause of the incomplete response of GAMT deficiency to existing therapies and the poor response of seizures to anticonvulsivants. Dr. Longo has submitted a proposal to discover an inhibitor of the synthesis of guanidinoacetate, which would normalize the guanidinoacetate concentration in GAMT patients. These novel drugs, given with creatine supplements, should normalize the brain chemistry of GAMT patients, thus reducing the frequency of seizures and facilitating intellectual development. To learn more about this exciting research, click here or watch Dr. Longo’s presentation at the CCDS 2020 Virtual Conference.
ClinGen Collaboration
The Association for Creatine Deficiencies is working with Geisinger, a National Institutes of Health (NIH) Clinical Genome Resource (ClinGen) grantee to share genetic and health information from the ACD registry and increase our understanding of genomics. ClinGen is an NIH-funded effort dedicated to identifying clinically relevant genes and variants for use in precision medicine and research. Through their existing registry, ACD is participating in the Patient Data Sharing Program to have certified genetic counselors review and share participants’ de-identified genetic and health information. Registry participants are able to direct whether or not they would like their de-identified data shared. Data sharing can help us better understand the relationship between genetics and health, clarify uncertain genetic testing results, and provide more information about a condition to inform treatment and management. Through data sharing, individual registry participants also can choose to receive updates about their genetic testing results.
References
- Savatt, J.M., Azzartiti, D.R, Faucett, W.A., Florin, J., Ledbetter, D.H., Miller, V.R., Palen, E., Rehm, H., Rhode, J., Rogers, L., Talbird, S., Trutoiu, L., Vidal, J.A., Waggoner, C., Riggs, E.R., Martin, C.L. Expanding Patient Data Sharing: GenomeConnect’s Pilot to Engage External Registries in Data Sharing. Poster presentation. Presented at the 38th Annual Education Conference for the National Society of Genetic Counselors, November 6, 2019, Salt Lake City, Utah.
- Savatt, J.M, Azzartiti, D.R, Faucett, W.A., Ledbetter, D.H., Miller, V.R., Palen, E., Rehm, H., Rhode, J., Rogers, L., Talbird, S., Trutoiu, L., Vidal, J.A., Riggs, E.R., Martin, C.L. ClinGen’s Patient Data Sharing Program: Leveraging Data Sharing Experience from GenomeConnect to Broaden Patient Data Sharing Efforts. Poster Presentation. Curating the Clinical Genome Meeting. May 30, 2019. Washington, DC.
