Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is a deadly disease that has swept the world by surprise in the past decade. ALS was first discovered by French neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot in 1869. It was not until Lou Gehrig, a hall of fame baseball player, brought the disease to international news in 1939. Lou Gehrig was diagnosed with the disease while he was still playing baseball, which in the end ended his career. Therefore, that is why ALS is also known as, 'Lou Gehrig's disease'. It is time to fight back against ALS and stop the disease in its track before it kills millions of more people. We as a nation should fight back against the deadly disease of ALS to raise awareness to the world, to inspire people through ALS survivors stories, and ultimately find a cure.
According to the ALS Association, "Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord" (alsa.org, 2014). Basically what happens is motor neurons are transmitted continuously from your brain to your spinal cord and muscles throughout your body. The ALS disease will stop all of the motor neurons from entering the brain, spinal cord, and your muscles by killing them until there are no more left. As the motor neurons die, the brain can no longer control muscle movements, leaving your body unable to move. Eventually, as more and more motor neurons die, the human body undergoes shock and leads to becoming paralyzed. Also while your muscles do not receive impulses from motor neurons to move, your muscles begin to atrophy or become visibly smaller.
Some of the symptoms in the early stages of ALS are exceedingly small and most of the time people overlook them. A person suffering from early stages of ALS, might experience muscle weakness in their hands, swallowing, legs, breathing, arms, or the muscles of speech. "Muscle weakness is a hallmark initial sign in ALS, occurring in approximately 60% of ALS patients" (alsa.org, 2014). A person in the early stages of ALS also might experience muscle cramps in their hands and feet, unable to project their voice, and twitching of muscles. The symptoms of the early stages of ALS do not seem serious at all. Everyone gets cramps in their muscles and muscle weakness here and there. These symptoms are usually causes from your everyday life. When the symptoms continue to happen over a long period of time or if the symptoms become worse is when you should consult a doctor. The more serious symptoms of ALS is when a person is unable to breathe normally or difficulty breathing and swallowing.
Furthermore, once a person is diagnosed with ALS, the area that is affected first will be the feet and hands. Once this happens, your body will start to feel very unusual and abnormal. The daily activities that you are used to doing when starting your day off such as getting dressed, brushing your teeth, and even buttoning up your shirt will become almost impossible to do by yourself. Also when the hands and feet are affected, you will find it difficult to lift something off the ground and even walking down the street. As the disease gets worse and begins to spread throughout the body, the paralysis overpowers the body's functions. Leaving the body unable to function like it use to. Once the body is brought into the paralysis state, the ability to breath, speak, swallow, and chew is very difficult. I guess you could say the only good thing about ALS is the disease does not affect any of the five senses.
On the other hand, the causes of ALS or at least what causes we have discovered so far will blow you away. It is unbelievable that these causes can happen to anyone at anytime in their life. It all comes down to whether the chemical molecules or organ systems in your body will ever fail during your lifespan. If this happens, your body will become extremely vulnerable to the ALS disease. With almost a century of research under our belts, the top research organizations have come up with several causes for ALS, but only three seem the most logical. It is sad to think that after an entire century of researching one disease, we only have three causes to show for it. This is another reason why the research organizations need more funding, so they can further the advancement of ALS research.
According to Medical News Today, the three main causes of ALS are disorganized immune response, chemical imbalance, and mishandling of proteins. I know these terms must sounds incredibly confusing at first but wait until you hear how Medical News Today described them. "Disorganized immune response is when the immune system may attack some of the body's cells, potentially killing nerve cells. Chemical imbalance is when people with ALS often have higher levels of glutamate, a chemical messenger in the brain, near the motor neurons. Glutamate in high quantities is known to be toxic to nerve cells. Mishandling of proteins is if proteins are not processed correctly by nerve cells, abnormal proteins could potentially accumulate and cause the nerve cells to die" (Medical News Today, 2015). The problem with these causes are they are not preventable. Basically, your body produces high levels of glutamate or your immune system kills nerve cells or it doesn't. There is really nothing you can do about it except talk to a doctor for medication to counter act those problems.
In addition to the question that people want to know more than anything about ALS is who does ALS affect most? Are most of the victims African American or are they Mexican American? Are the victims mostly male or female, young or old? The type of people affected by ALS is very surprising due to the fact that this specific race is the majority race throughout the world. If I were to guess the race that is affected most frequently by ALS, it would be between African Americans or Mexican Americans. Of course I would be wrong because Caucasian males make up the majority of ALS patients. "According to the ALS CARE Database, 60% of the people with ALS in the Database are men and 93% of patients in the Database are Caucasian" (alsa.org, 2014).
Also, at this very moment there are approximately 30,000 Americans that have ALS and about 5,600 people are diagnosed every year with the disease in the United States. Men are more likely to be diagnosed with ALS than women by more than 20%. Also ALS patients are more likely to be within the ages of 40 and 70 than any other age group. For some reason, the ALS disease likes to feast on older people, rather than younger people. Some more facts about ALS are, "half of all people affected with ALS live at least three or more years after diagnosis. Twenty percent live five years or more; up to ten percent will live more than ten years" (alsa.org, 2014). These statistics are incredibly sad to read knowing that once people are diagnosed with ALS, it is basically a death sentence. People who have ALS know they will die within ten years of attracting the disease. My heart breaks for all those victims.
In other words, the ALS disease has been known nationally and worldwide for the last 75 years. Ever since the famous baseball player, Lou Gehrig, was diagnosed with the disease, most people are now aware of this catastrophic illness that is wiping out Americans left and right. We as a nation cannot just sit back and watch helpless Americans die from this horrific disease. We need to take action to try and stop this deadly disease in its tracks. The last thing I would want to happen is for ALS to become the next cancer epidemic. If we do not take action as soon as possible, people will stop realizing how important of an issue ALS is. So far in our world today, some very honorable people have taken the initiative to start the fight against ALS. The ALS Association is the top association that is supporting the fight against ALS. Also the ALS Association is first in research and donations, making every day another step closer to finding a cure. "Since July 29, 2014, The ALS Association has received $115 million in donations" (alsa.org, 2011).
As well as the donations given to the ALS Association from millions of people throughout the world, the donations started with one man and one dream. This man's name is Pete Frates and his dream is, of course to find a cure for this deadly disease. Pete Frates was a former college baseball player for the University of Boston College. He was the team captain and always had a positive attitude about everything. He just loves life and loves spending it with his teammates, friends, and family. There was nothing that could crush his spirits or change his attitude about life, not even being diagnosed with ALS at the age of 28. Still to this day, Pete Frates carries the same joy and charisma for life as he did playing college baseball to now being stuck motionless in a chair every day.
Pete Frates has inspired millions of people around the world for his courage to never stop fighting the ALS disease. Pete also motivated other ALS patients in their fight against the disease. Believe it or not, that is not the only thing he has done. He also started a worldwide challenge that gave people a chance to contribute to the awareness of ALS. "Pete Frates is credited with creating the ALS ice bucket challenge along with friend and fellow ALS patient Pat Quinn of Yonkers, New York" (O'Connor, 2014). The ice bucket challenge is an activity that Pete created so people can know what it feels like to have ALS. As you pour the bucket of ice water over your head, your body becomes motionless and unable to move, just like people who suffer from ALS feel. The ALS ice bucket challenge was only started by Pete Frates so his close friends and family could do it and support him. You could never imagine what happened next. Well I guess the word got out about the ice bucket challenge and it became national news within days.
The ALS ice bucket challenge started with all of Pete Frates' Boston College classmates and friends which included NFL Quarterback Matt Ryan and NHL player Brian Boyle. From there, the challenge spread to all of Boston, which is Pete's hometown. Then it seemed like everyone wanted to get in on the action to support Pete. People from across the world began to post their ice bucket challenge videos on various social media sites to spread the word. Celebrities, professional athletes, and random college students like me accepted the challenge to raise awareness for ALS. Who knew dumping ice water over our heads could have such an impact on a nation. I really think the ice bucket challenge has brought people together for a cause and to care about something other than what is going on in their lives. Even better, who knew a simple activity could raise millions and millions of dollars for ALS. "People dumping ice water on their heads for a cause have helped raised over $100 million for ALS" (O'Connor, 2014).
Even though, the ice bucket challenge donations and the other donations to the ALS Association are up to $100 million, we cannot stop raising money and awareness for ALS. Our goal as a nation should be to raise $200 million by next summer and so on. We can never stop because the more money we raise, the closer we will get to finding a cure. We cannot let innocent people die while people who do not have the disease can do something about it. Pete Frates did everything he could to let people know how important finding a cure for ALS is. Pete started it, now we just have to finish it.
There is another story about a courageous man that will make you want to conquer the world. You will want to crush any obstacle that is in your way from being happy and successful. Steve Gleason, who was a former professional football player, will inspire you no matter what your going through in life. You might be in the middle of a divorce or unemployed, no matter what it is, after you listen to what Steve Gleason has to say you will overcome anything. Steve Gleason had everything going right in his life. He was a professional football in the best shape of his life, while having a beautiful family and all the money he could want. Honestly, who wouldn't be happy with that life?
Well, he had all of this until he was diagnosed with ALS and is now unable to move any parts of his body. Gleason has to type on a tablet with his eyes and use technology to be able to speak. Now if you had a choice of which life you would want to live, everyone would choose the football. The one thing that inspires people the most is the fact that Steve Gleason would rather live his life with ALS than not. He is now more happy than he has ever been. That is incredible to think about that Gleason would choose a life where he can't even get up and use the bathroom over a life where he plays professional football. That really shows you what type of person he is. Everyone should aspire to live a life like Steve Gleason.
A life dedicated to helping the world and encouraging everyone that there are no limits in life and to never stop fighting for your dreams. "In 2011, he created Team Gleason with family and friends to support people with ALS and to increase awareness of the disease" (Gleason, 2014). Also Steve Gleason is a key contributor in raising awareness for ALS and encouraging the government to aid people who have been diagnosed with ALS with speaking technology. "We can allow people who choose to live with ALS and other physically debilitating disease to continue to be productive and to access the only "cure" available at this time - normal, basic technology that everyone, even toddlers use." This technology will be available to people with ALS only if we do our part in helping to raise awareness. Let's do our part in ensuring people with ALS will sustain an enjoyable and fulfilling life.
"There is currently no cure for ALS. Treatment focuses on the alleviation of symptoms" (Medical News Today, 2015). This statement is extremely difficult to read when you want to find the cure so badly. Sooner or later we have to come across something that will cure ALS for good. The only way that is possible is if we as a nation can keep raising money for ALS foundations. The more money we have will allow us to obtain more research, which will result in finding the cure sooner. We must find ways to elongate the lifespan of people with ALS. I believe those people are dying off too soon and way too young. If we can get everyone on board with supporting ALS awareness, there is no doubt in my mind we can find a cure and end ALS once and for all.
In conclusion, we still have not found a cure yet. With the amount of money ALS Association has received in the past seven months, the quality of research will improve tremendously. Hopefully with the improvement in research, we can finally find a cure and save thousands of people's lives. Finding a cure for ALS is an extremely important issue, I hope no one takes it lightly. Every day we sit around and not try to raise awareness for ALS, the more people are dying. If you want to save America, stop ALS. Do not let this deadly disease kill any more innocent Americans. As a nation, we need to stand up for one another, no matter what gets in our way.
It was not until Lou Gehrig, a hall of fame baseball player, brought the disease to international news in 1939.
- Don't end this thought with a period. This is a hanging sentence. It needs a verb to complete the thought. What did the subject, Lou Gehrig, do for the illness once his celebrity brought it to the attention of international news? Did the scientific community pay more attention it it? Did new studies and medications emerge after it affected Mr. Gehrig?
We as a nation should fight back against the deadly disease of ALS to raise awareness to the world, to inspire people through ALS survivors stories, and ultimately find a cure.
- As an overview, you can add a little information here about the topics the you will be discussing in the rest of the essay. You can mention the most current drugs, treatments, or therapies that are in use for the treatment of ALS.. Doing so will introduce and prepare the reader for the discussion to come and will help to keep the reader interested in the research you are about to present.
If I were to guess the race that is affected most frequently by ALS, it would be between African Americans or Mexican Americans. Of course I would be wrong because Caucasian males make up the majority of ALS patients
- Blake, when you write these research essays, never mention a personal opinion. Don't use the first person pronouns as it removes the academic slant and bias free form of writing. It would help your essay to read as more credible if you would remove this personal opinion from the paragraph it is currently in.
The last thing I would want to happen is for ALS to become the next cancer epidemic.
- Change the slant of this sentence from personal to collective by using the term "we" and the sentence will be less personally slanted and more acceptable.
When you start talking about the ALS bucket challenge, try to present more information about how the challenge has helped to improve the research into the illness and what results it has helped to produce. Since the Bucket Challenge really became a world wide trend, you should be presenting information that shows how mass media has helped to not only shed more focus on the illness, but also to develop a cure through such kinds of promotions. Don't spend so much time presenting the background and history of the ALS bucket challenge as everyone is more than familiar with it already.
Your essay needs to find a true focus. What do you really want to present to the reader? As of this moment, the essay covers so many topics but does not really fully discuss a complete issue. You first spoke about the history of ALS, then the way that we should all be concerned about finding a cure to ALS, then you spoke of how contributions have poured in to the research. Yet, you did not present any discussion of the currently available treatments, regardless of how effective or ill - effective, promising or not promising that treatment is.
Treatment focuses on the alleviation of symptoms
This is the most important part of this essay as I read it and yet it is the most underdeveloped part. In order to make your reader actually care about ALS and inspire people to help find a cure through donations, you need to show that we are gaining ground research-wise when it comes to finding a cure. I don't see any reference nor a strong sense of that interest and desire coming from you in this version of the essay.
