Donate us your saliva! It is the appeal of Labion, the Laboratory of Nanomedicine and Clinical Biophotonics founded in 2006 within the Don Carlo Gnocchi Foundation. For some years the laboratory, thanks to methods based on advanced spectroscopies, has been working to “extract” from saliva – a biological sample that is very easy to take, even in delicate patients – the “molecular signature” which is characteristic of some pathologies. “From the salivary analysis we are able to distinguish a patient suffering from ALS, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s or other pathologies such as the respiratory one”, explains Dr. Marzia Bedoni, biologist, co-founder and scientific director of Labion.
In essence, the Alzheimer’s patient has a molecular signature – and therefore different peaks in the spectroscopy performed on saliva – from the healthy person or the one with Parkinson’s. A saliva sample is enough and in a few minutes neurodegenerative diseases such as ALS and Parkinson’s can be diagnosed early, before the synthons appear. To continue with the research, it is necessary to have saliva samples from healthy people, to further refine the comparison between the samples. Hence the appeal to people over 40, in good health, to present themselves on Friday morning at the Labion (at the Don Gnocchi Foundation – IRCCS Center “S. Maria Nascente”, via Alfonso Capecelatro 66, Milan) to donate their sample of saliva. On the VITA Instagram page, you can listen to the live broadcast with Marzia Bedoni.