Dementia Prevention Research Institute of Texas (DPRIT)

Priorities for Republican leadership last legislative session have either been stuck in the courts or left to linger in the state rulemaking process.

The dementia fund's approval comes at a critical moment for Texas, which ranks second in the nation in Alzheimer's deaths and third in the disease's prevalence. The need for intervention is especially high in the Rio Grande Valley — a four-county region along the Texas-Mexico border that's become the epicenter of a nationwide Alzheimer's spike.