Robert Racette and his colleagues have posted a large kindred of an Amish family with a basal ganglia disease - parkinson syndrome/disease in this issue of the journal Neurology. I am not one of his colleagues, but could get reprints if someone is interested in this.

The Anabaptist genealogy records may become increasingly important as we look for various genes that cause certain afflictions within our families. Likewise, as we look at our families, we find that there are some who have extraordinarily long lives - and it is not uncommon to have persons over 90. Thus, there are beneficial genes which not only seem to protect us from the ravages of disease, but also of dementia and other debilitating disorders.

Would that we know more about these issues.

John Steiner