Parkinson's Disease: What Is It?

Parkinson’s disease Definition:

The Parkinson’s disease is known to be a neurodegenerative form of medical condition that is said to be caused due to insufficient amounts of dopamine present in the brain. As per reports it has been seen that one out of 500 people are known to get affected with this condition hence Parkinson’s is termed as a common medical condition. Every year there are more than 60,000 cases of just Parkinson’s disease alone being reported. During the early stages of this condition the face may tend to show either little or no expression at all or the arms may not swing when you are walking which otherwise used to happen. The speech of the individual starts to become slurry and soft.

Parkinson’s disease Symptoms:

Few of the most common symptoms of Parkinson’s disease an individual would experience are movement which is slowed down, there is stiffness experienced in the muscle, imbalance, tremors and having difficulty in walking. Reach out to the doctor the day you suspect that the symptoms are all related to the Parkinson’s condition. The symptoms are known to mostly occur from on one side of the body in the beginning and then they would worsen on that side even when the symptoms start to affect both the sides of the body.

Parkinson’s disease Causes:

It is still a mystery as to what exactly causes Parkinson’s disease but it is known to believe that a reduction in the levels of dopamine in the brain can lead to the occurrence of Parkinson’s disease. In the condition of Parkinson’s disease there are certain nerve cells or known as neurons present in the brain that tend to gradually breakdown or it can die.

Most of the symptoms occur due to loss of neurons that are known to produce a chemical messenger in the brain called as the dopamine. When the amount of dopamine reduces it leads to an abnormal kind of brain activity which in turn leads to signs of Parkinson’s disease. It has also been seen that there are certain changes which occur in the brain of the individual even though it is still not clear as to why they occur but these changes would include, the presence of the lewy bodies and the alpha synuclein which is found in the lewy bodies.

Parkinson’s disease Risk factors:

It has been seen that anyone can get this condition but individuals who are aged above 60 years are very much prone to get this condition. Apart from age, other factors would include sex of the individual wherein men are more prone to this condition than women, getting oneself exposed to the toxins such as herbicides, pesticides and hereditary cause.

Parkinson’s cannot be termed as a contagious medical condition and it also does not spread from one person to another.

Progression of this disease:

The symptoms related to Parkinson’s is known to develop gradually and slowly. It also progressively worsens as time passes. But this condition does not lead to death. The symptoms are only known to get worse as the time goes by.

Parkinson’s disease Treatment:

Similar to the cause, there is no specific form of treatment for Parkinson’s disease. But there are several forms of treatments made available for helping the patients suffering from this condition to lead a happy as well as quality life. The doctor can also recommend the individual to carry out certain lifestyle changes such as going in for aerobic classes or yoga.

In certain cases, there would be need to carry out physical therapy that is said to focus mainly on stretching as well as balancing. For those with speech issues, going in for a speech pathologist would help in the improvement of the speech. The use of medications are known to help in managing the problems in terms of walking, tremor or movement. These kinds of medicines are known to increase or substitute for dopamine.

There may be certain amount of improvement seen in the symptoms post the start of the Parkinson’s disease treatment. Gradually as time passes the benefits of this medications tend to diminish quite frequently or they tend to become less consistent even though when the symptoms would become fairly well controlled.  Ensure to also have a healthy and well balanced diet so as to help in easing the symptoms.