Dr Le Heron takes title of 2024 Alzheimers NZ Fellow

Distinguished neurologist and cognitive neuroscientist, Dr Campbell Le Heron, has been made the 2024 Alzheimers NZ Fellow for his work researching and managing cognitive disorders.

Dr Le Heron has a particular focus on dementia mate wareware and how best to diagnose the underlying causes of it, as well as understanding the brain mechanisms underlying changes in behaviour that often accompany neurodegenerative disorders.

The Alzheimers NZ Fellowship provides the recipient with $15,000 to support their research. 

“I am very humbled to receive this award and am grateful to Alzheimers NZ for their support for my research, which will assist me to continue this important work,” he said.

Dr Le Heron is a consultant neurologist with Te Whatu Ora / Health NZ in Waitaha Canterbury, a senior lecturer at the University of Otago’s Department of Medicine in Christchurch and a cognitive neuroscientist with the New Zealand Brain Research Institute.

As well as his broader research into cognitive disorders, he established a Young Onset Dementia Clinic which diagnoses and manages people with dementia mate wareware under the age of 65 and aims to provide an integrated clinical, research and community approach to neurodegenerative disorders. He also runs the Aotearoa New Zealand site of a large international clinical trial for people with genetic Alzheimers disease to better understand this rare condition and investigate novel therapeutic treatments for Alzheimers in this unique group of people.

He says he has a “fascination with the brain” and he’s lucky to work in a very people-focussed specialty.

“It’s a privilege as a doctor to share in even a small part of a person’s dementia journey and to work alongside them. We need to keep shining a light on dementia.”

He admits his dementia mate wareware research gives him a sense of “palpable excitement”.

“There’s so much potential in the treatments we are studying but equally, there’s so much more to do. What is clear though is that our approach as a society and health system to the diagnosis and management of Alzheimers disease, and dementia more generally, must undergo a paradigm shift to keep pace with our evolving scientific understanding.

“We – clinicians, researchers, community groups, people affected by these conditions and their whanau – all need to work together to advocate for the things that we know matter, and that we are learning matter, for people living with dementia.”

Alzheimers NZ chair, Clare Hynd, is a firm believer in the ‘collective approach’ espoused by Dr Le Heron.

“The dementia mate wareware sector is very clear that we want to partner with Government to find practicable solutions to the very serious problem that rapidly rising dementia mate wareware numbers pose to our country.

“Not only do we need clinical and treatment breakthroughs like the ones Dr Le Heron is researching, and for which he was awarded this Fellowship, but we also need to reduce dementia mate wareware risk and provide better support to the thousands of New Zealanders who are living with dementia mate wareware now and those who will develop it as they age.”

She is urging Government to start by acknowledging the serious risk dementia mate wareware poses to the country’s struggling health and aged care sectors, implementing the Dementia Mate Wareware Action Plan and providing fair and appropriate funding for the country’s 17 community-based Alzheimers and dementia support services.

“Researchers and clinicians like Dr Le Heron can only do so much. The dementia mate wareware sector itself can only do so much.

“But if we could all work together with Government, we could achieve real breakthroughs for New Zealanders living with dementia mate wareware.”