ALS Ice Bucket Challenge Progress
ALS 101 - Educational Video Series
The ALS Association Golden West Chapter is proud to introduce a new educational series, entitled ALS 101 that is intended to serve as a comprehensive overview about the disease. Our deepest thanks to Dallas Forshew, RN, BSN for creating this presentation.
As an active member of the Golden West Chapter, Dallas Forshew has served on our care services committee and attends many community outreach events, like the Chapter’s Walks to Defeat ALS and Napa Valley Ride to Defeat ALS. She works tirelessly to advocate and raise awareness about ALS at local, state, and national levels and has become well-known throughout the ALS community for her extensive knowledge of the disease. As a research manager, Dallas was one of a panel who proved expert testimony in support of funding an $18 million dollar research grant from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM). She is a regular participant in the California ALS Research Summit.
Dallas has been a key staff member at two ALS Certified Treatment Centers of Excellence: the ALS Treatment and Research Center at UCSF and the Forbes Norris ALS Treatment and Research Center at California Pacific Medical Center. She has also served on the Association’s certification committee for new centers. In her capacity as a clinical trial evaluator and designer, she has advocated for the patient perspective and has helped influence trial design and management in favor of patient issues. Additionally, she was the only nurse member of the American Academy of Neurology’s ALS Practice Parameter Task Force, helping to develop, author, and later update its important guidance document. She has written patient care manuals and has over 50 publications to her name, including many book chapters about ALS. In 2016, she received The ALS Association's prestigious Lawrence A. Rand Prize for her passionate work to improve the lives of people living with ALS.
Since 2005, Dallas often spends at least one weekend a month traveling across our service area in 31 counties in California and the state of Hawaii, to speak with hundreds of people with ALS and their families at Golden West Chapter support groups. Her introductory presentation, THE ABC’s OF ALS, has been presented to hundreds of newly diagnosed families and has been viewed over 1000 times on the Golden West Chapter’s YouTube channels and at training sessions for ALS Association professionals. Dallas has since developed this unique lecture, ALS 101, and together we have created this video series to help people who may be less familiar with the disease learn more as well as educating the public about important resources available for people who are living with ALS.
