VCU Health physicians are treating ALS patients and pushing forward in the search for a cure.

ALS affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. Its name is derived from Greek and refers to a wasting away of the muscles responsible for controlling voluntary movement caused by a lack of nourishment, the fault of a genetic mutation.

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis is a neurodegenerative disease that affects the nervous system; around 400,000 people live with it worldwide. View on euronews

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a group of progressive diseases that affect the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that control muscle movement. People with ALS will gradually lose the ability to use their muscles. Many experts refer to ALS as a single disease, though it is an umbrella term for a group of diseases.

“This is fairly untypical,” says Lucie Bruijn, the ALS Association’s chief scientist, adding that she is not aware of anyone who has survived ALS longer than Hawking did. Hawking was also able to evade the dementia that some people with ALS experience toward the later phases of the disease, she says.