A Fight Close to Home: Lou Cannataro’s Mission to End Alzheimer’s

For Lou Cannataro, Founding Partner of Cannataro Family Capital Partners, this year’s Manhattan Walk to End Alzheimer’s carried a weight unlike any other. On the very morning thousands gathered in Central Park to continue the fight against the disease, Lou’s brother Gene passed away. Yet Lou chose to walk—surrounded by a community that understood his grief with striking clarity.

“Last year, Gene was actually able to attend the walk,” Lou reflects. “It wasn’t easy, but his wife Claudia—his rock—was by his side helping him be present. This year felt surreal. To know he had just passed that morning, and to stand in a sea of people fighting the very disease that took him—it was overwhelming. But it was comforting too. The people around me understood my pain.”

Gene’s battle with Alzheimer’s didn’t just shape Lou’s understanding of the disease—it transformed his advocacy. Lou speaks with conviction and urgency when discussing the realities so often misunderstood about Alzheimer’s. “The fight against Alzheimer’s is extremely personal for me,” he says. “What most people don’t realize is that many of us are already in this battle; we just don’t know it yet. This is not an old person’s disease. It can invade your brain in your 20s and 30s, long before symptoms show.”

This year brought a major shift in that awareness. With the FDA approving a simple blood test to detect Alzheimer’s, Lou believes the future of early diagnosis is finally within reach.

Lou hopes families facing an Alzheimer’s diagnosis understand that they no longer have to navigate this journey alone. “You don’t have to fight in silence or shame,” he says. “Today we have early detection tools, two treatments for early-stage Alzheimer’s, and incredible free services from the Alzheimer’s Association. There is support, there is community, and there is hope.”

But hope, he stresses, must be paired with action. Lou is passionate about improving both research efforts and the caregiving landscape. “We need continued breakthroughs in treatment,” he urges. “We need a medical community better educated in diagnosing and managing Alzheimer’s. And families desperately need a playbook to guide them as caregivers. Too many are thrown into this role without any roadmap.”

Lou’s professional world has been shaped by these insights as well. At Cannataro Family Capital Partners, he takes a deeply personal approach to long-term planning—one informed by the realities of Alzheimer’s caregiving. “A diagnosis can be financially devastating, especially with early onset,” he explains. “Families need to secure long-term care insurance early and structure assets in ways that protect them. Advisors must also be trained to recognize early cognitive decline, especially when clients are the ones making big financial decisions. It’s essential.”

As a leader in generational wealth and legacy planning, Lou ensures that his clients—and their children and grandchildren—approach financial planning with preparation and unity. “We monitor every aspect of our clients’ defensive and offensive planning,” he says.

To learn about Cannataro Family Capital Partners, please visit https://cfcp.nm.com