In June 2023, Larry Yust began experiencing vision problems, disorientation, had to quit driving, and had to drop out of a competitive pool league. After extensive medical investigations working with a local neurologist and later Boston Mass General, he was diagnosed with Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) in June 2024 - a rare, progressive, and typically fatal neurological disorder.
Fortunately, after years of research a possible cure or a way to slow the progression for the disease began clinical trials in January 2024 with 24 people in worldwide locations. Larry is working with a neurologist team at BMG to enter a second round of clinical trials in the fall of 2024 and is being evaluated to make sure he satifies the criteria. This is to ensure there are no adverse reactions.
Our family is very hopeful for Larry because this disease often progresses very quickly in the time frame from weeks to months and we believe he has had this for almost a year. Thankfully, his progression has been slow. Larry has been married for 46 years to Pam with 3 children and 7 grandchildren ages 8 to 2.
Larry has been jogging, working out and lost weight with great support from family and friends. Larry maintains a positive attitude, does his own research to better understand the disease, and considers this a personal moonshot to survive this disease that has a 100% mortality rate. He tries self-healing techniques by talking to his brain daily and learned how critical vision is because everything is harder aned takes much longer, even simple tasks. He still maintains his sense of humor despite all of this.
Larry got his pilot’s license at age 19 and developed a passion for flight which helped him get his first job at Sperry Flight Systems and a BSE from Purdue University. Sperry later became a part of Honeywell. He worked on safety critical systems for 45 years before CJD diagnosis. Some career highlights are:
- Worked as part of team to enhance a custom processor that was developed in 1975 for a Boeing 737 flight controls program. He later led a team to take the processor board and turn it into a custom computer chip for a A320/A340 Flight Management Systems. Larry was a Technical Manager and worked on other programs such as the Boeing 787 Flight Control System, the Boeing 777 Core Avionics Custom Chip Development.
- Relocated his family to Germany as the onsite lead for a research program for Airbus and 4 German Companies.
- Relocated to Singapore as a Customer Engineer working directly with the airlines in Singapore, Hong Kong and Indonesia.
- He relocated back to Germany for business pursuits for the A380.
- Relocated to France for the A380 Flight Management Systems.
- Relocated back to US, he worked the Boeing 787 Flight Control Systems.
- Lead an effort to develop a joint development agreement between Honeywell and TTTech and later went to work for TTTech. First application was for the network on the Orion Space Capsule and represented TTTech at the Orion First Test Flight at Kennedy Space Center on December 5th 2014.
- He worked with many of the NASA Space Centers.
- He worked many other programs.
How You Can Help:
- Join our team for the CJD Foundation walk on October 5th - participate from anywhere!
- Donate to #loveforlfy if you can't walk
- Help raise awareness for CJD research and treatment
All registration fees and donations support the CJD Foundation.
Together, we can support Larry's "personal moonshot" to survive CJD and contribute to finding a cure for this devastating disease.
#loveforlfy