Earlier this year, AFTD’s Board of Directors approved an ambitious new Strategic Plan to guide our mission through June 2025. Written with input from a wide range of stakeholders and put into effect during a landmark anniversary for AFTD, our new Strategic Plan seeks to bring the hope of our community to action.

“Twenty years ago, Helen-Ann Comstock founded the organization we now call AFTD, the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration, after losing her husband Craig to FTD,” AFTD CEO Susan L-J Dickinson and Board Chair David Pfeifer said in a cowritten statement. “Our latest Strategic Plan charts a clear course to advance a world with compassionate care, effective support, and a future free of FTD.”

The 2022-2025 plan is centered around four primary goals crafted around a series of strategic themes identifying areas where AFTD’s attention is most needed:

Goal 1 – Advance diagnosis, therapeutics, and a cure for all.

AFTD is addressing challenges to receiving diagnosis and care by fostering a diverse global community of FTD-focused researchers, expanding and empowering a research-ready community of persons diagnosed and those at genetic risk, and developing and refining tools and resources for FTD research.

Goal 2 – Ensure that high quality, responsive FTD care and support are available to anyone in need, at every stage of this journey.

Obtaining effective FTD care can be challenging, which is why AFTD is working to actively disseminate promising practices in FTD care and support. AFTD is also working to scale current programs to reach more people in the Black, Native American, Latinx, AAPI, veteran, LGTBQ+, and rural communities.

Goal 3 – Advance awareness of FTD and expand AFTD’s national and global reach.

FTD remains a too little known and too frequently misunderstood disease. AFTD will take advantage of increasingly sophisticated analytics to refine our outreach efforts. Additionally, AFTD is developing a bolder advocacy agenda, increasing volunteer engagement, and empowering more donors to sustain and accelerate our mission.

Goal 4 – Strengthen and diversify the organization, to ensure meaningful impact for all we serve.

To ensure that we can have a meaningful impact for all we serve, AFTD is promoting a culture where
staff can thrive and succeed, and is developing the tools, knowledge, and processes to ensure strong organizational governance.

“Twenty years ago, with little to go on beyond hope and a sense that something needed to change, I took the action I saw as necessary to help others facing FTD,” said AFTD founder Helen-Ann Comstock. “If you find this Strategic Plan and its vision inspiring, I encourage you to join us and offer whatever help you are able to provide, whether as a volunteer, a donor, or simply someone making a suggestion about how we can serve this community better. Every little bit helps.”

We encourage you to read our new Strategic Plan — click here to learn more.