‘ALS Across America’ Campaign Inspires

New York Times Profile of People with ALS;

 ALS Association Experts To Blog Next Week

 

A Southern California musician, a biology professor in Pennsylvania, a former paratrooper from Boston and a Maryland woman who has the inherited form of ALS are among the six people profiled starting today in The New York Times online health section, Patient Voices, at http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/10/19/health/healthguide/TE_ALS.html

 

The series features audio of the people in their words describing their life with Lou Gehrig’s Disease, along with audio of a Louisiana woman caring for her daughter with ALS and an Ohio woman who took care of her husband until he passed away from ALS. These profiles are complemented by photographs with information that describes the disease and provides more details about each individual. 

 

Three of the six individuals profiled in Patient Voices were previously chronicled by The ALS Association during its national “ALS Across America” campaign last May for ALS Awareness Month.    

 

Dr. Lucie Bruijn, chief scientist of The Association, and Sharon Matland, vice president of patient services for The Association, will participate in a question-and-answer blog tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, November 3 for this installment of Patient Voices. 

 

The Association worked closely with the newspaper to arrange the interviews which were done in person by New York Times photographers who conducted the interviews and captured the images across the nation in August and September. Each actual online audio is approximately one to two minutes in length and is accompanied by a series of photographs.  

 

 “A diagnosis of a chronic disease, mental illness or condition can change one’s life in many ways. In Patient Voices, we feature first person accounts of the changes, challenges and rewards patients face as they cope with various health issues,” according to the New York Times.

 

Patient Voices has focused on many diseases in the past including cancer, multiple sclerosis, AIDS and HIV, Crohn’s disease, lupus, cystic fibrosis and Type 2 diabetes.

 

The New York Times reports its Web site is visited by 20 million people each day. The print version of the newspaper also will promote the section.