We Proudly Accept the ALS #IceBucketChallenge: 10 Things You Should Know About ALS

If you walked the halls of Kinaxis headquarters today at lunch you may have noticed plenty of folks that were dripping wet. Here's why. After being nominated for the ALS ice bucket challenge, we proudly accepted! We are happy to bring awareness to ALS and the fight against it. We are also going to make a $1000.00 donation to the ALS Association. Next, we would like to nominate our partner GT Nexus, our customers First Solar as well as Flexera Software to this challenge, which is to be completed in the next 24 hours. The Ice Bucket Challenge is awesome because it is raising money for ALS. Here's 10 things you should know about this disease:

1. ALS stands for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease, which is a rapidly progressive neuromuscular disease:

• Motor nerve cells die
• Voluntary muscles degenerate
• The senses are unimpaired and the intellect may remain unaffected[1]

2. Every 90 minutes someone in the US is diagnosed with ALS
3. The incidence rate is nearly identical for ALS and MS (2 per 100,000)
4. More than a dozen different familial genetic mutations have been linked to onset, however, the vast majority of ALS is considered sporadic with the exact cause(s) unknown
5. ALS is also considered by most to be a heterogeneous disorder, with site of onset, progression rates and overall survival varying dramatically from patient to patient
6. Because the process is one only of exclusion, it can take a year or more to get a confirmed diagnosis of ALS on average
7. While the reason is unknown, military vets are twice as likely to develop ALS
8. There are more than 150 potential treatments being looked at for ALS in the US today
9. ALS is NOT just an old person’s disease, many people in their 20s and 30s are diagnosed
10. The ALS clinical network is incredibly supportive for trial initiation, enrollment and retention[2]