Huntington’s Disease was recognized as an inherited disorder in 1872 when a 22-year-old doctor, George Huntington, wrote a paper on the disease – giving it its name “Huntington’s chorea”. ‘Chorea’ means “to dance”. The name comes from the involuntary movements that often follows with the disease. Today, we call it ‘Huntington’s disease’, because there are more to it than just movements.
For a long time, little was known about Huntington’s. However, over the last 25 years we have learnt a lot: causes, effects, treatment, therapies and techniques for managing the symptoms. For instance, researchers identified the “Huntington gene” in 1993, which made it possible for people to undergo predictive genetic testing.
Huntington’s disease is a hereditary genetic disorder meaning that each child of a parent that has been diagnosed with the disease has a 50% chance of inheriting it and are said to be “at-risk”. In Europe, Huntington’s occurs in approximately 1 in 10 000 people.
There is currently no cure for the disease, but brilliant scientists work around the clock to develop treatments.