In episode 19 we chat with Dr Megan Eldred, Senior Policy Advisor and Dementia Mission Lead at the Office for Life Sciences. Megan walked us through her journey from PhD and potential academia, to transition into the UK Civil Service and the work she does with the Office for Life Sciences. She told us about her journey to becoming the senior policy adviser and dementia mission lead on everything that entails. More generally, the Mission aims to develop novel precision medicine tools that help boost the number and speed of clinical trials in dementia neurodegeneration. This is a much-needed and highly impactful endeavour. We all know somebody who is suffering from or who has suffered from dementia. It is devastating and still has massive unmet clinical needs and is a huge cost and burden to society that is a burden that is getting bigger because of an ageing population. Megan talked about some interesting scientific and commercial developments in this field, including the approval of two drugs to slow the progression of dementia. We spoke about cures for Alzheimer's disease and how close and how far away we are. We also spoke about psychedelics, exercise, the mind-body connection and burnout. As always, I would encourage you, if you're enjoying this podcast, to like and subscribe, the best thing you can possibly do to support Inside Matters is to hover your finger over the five star reviews and to kindly give us five stars. This helps bump us up the algorithm, helping the podcast reach more people that will ultimately benefit from the no-cost scientific information that we're delivering to you, the listener. Timestamps: 00:00:00:00 -Intro   00:01:51:04 - Dr McIlroy’s neurodegenerative family history   00:04:01:20 - Dutch care home designed for dementia   00:04:43:02 - Japanese robotic seal   00:06:35:06 - Pet dogs and our microbiome   00:07:41:10 - Link between microbiome and depression   00:09:17:07 - Mice research   00:11:44:02 - Can the microbiome cure depression longterm?   00:13:30:01 - How habits are formed   00:15:22:27 - Addictions and their cure   00:19:15:28 - Fight or flight responses   00:25:41:01 - Building resilience   00:27:57:24 - Choosing a career path   00:30:36:20 - Undertaking a physiology degree   00:33:03:02 - Unknown unknowns   00:35:50:08 - The cell fate in the retina   00:37:55:24 - Intelligent design?   00:41:55:10 - Micro-dosing   00:49:33:11 - Understanding the retina   00:55:10:29 - Starting a career in the civil service   00:59:13:24 - Scientists working for the government   01:04:59:23 - Centre for Science and Policy   01:08:59:15 - Role as lead at Office for Life Sciences   01:14:46:09 - Focus on biomarkers   01:17:52:04 - Drugs approval for treating dimensia   01:20:10:10 - Understanding the disease pathway   01:24:51:08 - Funding research   01:26:44:21 - Our Future Health   01:34:28:01 - Sharing IP with competitors   01:39:45:24 - CSF testing   01:41:51:12 - Inflammation and the disease pathway   01:43:13:15 - Vaccine for cognitive disease?   01:46:19:27 - Conclusion