The first article of results from ALS Quest has been published! ALS Quest is looking for risk factors that might precipitate motor neurone disease (MND) and participants (with or without MND) complete an online anonymous questionnaire. The first set of data analysis has looked at the ratio of the length of the index finger to the ring finger and incidence of MND.
For this first set of data, the researchers focused on this ratio and its potential to indicate risk of getting MND. A previous study (by other researchers) reported a lower mean ratio in patients with ALS compared with controls. To see if the results of this study could be validated with a larger number of subjects, ALS Quest data was used. The ALS data does not indicate a link between MND and the ratio. You can read the full paper here http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/7/8/e016924.
ALS Quest is an ongoing project and you are invited to complete the online anonymous questionnaire. You will be asked series of questions about you that may give clues as to what factors trigger MND. All people are can now complete the questionnaire - people with the sporadic form of MND (that is, the type that does not affect other family members), people with familial MND, relatives and others without MND. The questionnaire, designed by Dr Roger Pamphlett at the University of Sydney, and instructions for how to complete it can be found at www.alsquest.org.