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About 1.5 million Americans are living with Parkinson’s disease, according to the National Parkinson Foundation. The illness destroys brain cells that produce dopamine, taking away a person’s ability to control body movements and eventually leading to death. When about 80 percent of the dopamine-producing cells die, symptoms of the disease first appear.
WHY CATCH IT EARLY? Since the most effective treatments for Parkinson’s can only slow the disease, it’s important to start medication early. “That is the big goal in Parkinson’s disease — neuroprotective treatments rather than symptomatic therapy,” Flint Beal, M.D., a neurologist at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University, told Ivanhoe. Drugs like selegiline, which was shown in early studies to delay progression of the disease, and dopamine agonists, which have been shown to protect dopamine cells and kill free radicals, are most effective if started early in the progression of Parkinson’s disease.
EARLY SYMPTOMS: While some patients who know they have a genetic predisposition to Parkinson’s get tested before symptoms emerge, others wait until they see signs of the disease. The National Parkinson Foundation says patients may experience initial symptoms for a year or more before they seek medical attention. To catch the disease early, patients should watch out for symptoms like tremor in an arm or leg, stiffness, balance problems, rigidity, postural instability and slowness of movement. These symptoms usually begin on one side of the body and become more severe on that side before spreading.
CUTTING-EDGE TESTS: Traditional tests for Parkinson’s include a physical exam to check for tremor, rigidity, gait, postural instability and decreased blink reflex. New advances in diagnosis of the disease are making treatment more effective and long-lasting. One of those advances is a blood test that identifies compounds unique to patients with the disease. The test has also been shown to be effective in singling out patients with Huntington’s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
Another promising diagnostic technique for Parkinson’s comes in the form of a skin test. A recent study shows screening for the presence of certain protein deposits in tissue samples may determine if an individual has Parkinson’s disease. Through autopsy, researchers took tissue samples from the central nervous system of 279 patients and identified those who had protein deposits called Lewy bodies, which are characteristic of Parkinson’s. They then looked at skin tissue samples from those patients and found 23.5 percent of them also had Lewy bodies present in their skin. None of the patients who didn’t have Lewy bodies in the central nervous system had them in their skin. In addition, Lewy bodies were found in the skin of 70 percent of Parkinson’s patients.
