Edward F. Ansello, Ph.D., director, the Virginia Center on Aging, School of Allied Health Professions

Edward F. Ansello, was the keynote speaker at the first "Down Syndrome and Alzheimer's Disease Conference" held earlier this month in Devens, Mass. Organizers plan to make the conference an annual event.

Jointly sponsored by the Alzheimer's Association of Massachusetts and New Hampshire and the Massachusetts Department of Mental Retardation, the conference, titled "Honoring the Person Within," recognized recent extraordinary increases in life expectancy for individuals with Down syndrome and the challenges and opportunities that they present to health and human services systems when they acquire Alzheimer's disease in their longer lives.

Ansello discussed strategies for successfully bringing together agencies without a history of previous collaboration, drawing upon his experiences in Virginia. He leads the Area Planning and Services Committee, a coalition in metropolitan Richmond of two dozen agencies and individuals that train family caregivers and direct service providers about aging with lifelong disabilities and try to find creative solutions to unprecedented problems.

School of Allied Health Professions