Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease is a syndrome of progressive damage to the nervous system manifested by a reduced overall physical activity, slowness of movement (bradykinesia), tremor, and anincreased muscle tone. They distinguish primary or idiopathic Parkinson's disease, secondary parkinsonism (vascular, drug, post-traumatic, postencephalitic etc.) and parkinsonian syndrome in degenerative and hereditary diseases of the central nervous system. The average age of the onset of PD is 55 years. At the same time, the disease will begin at 10% of patients of the young age under 40. In this case, the condition is called juvenile-onset parkinsonism. The disease occurs in children and adolescents, in this case, medical experts call it Hunt’s syndrome characterized by a slow progress and classic symptoms of Parkinson's disease.
The incidence of Parkinson's disease is independent of gender, race, social status and place of residence. In the later stages of the disease quality of life is significantly reduced. At gross violations of swallowing patients quickly lose weight. In cases of prolonged immobility death of patients is caused by the accession respiratory disorders and bed sores. The origin of Parkinson's disease is not fully investigated, however, as the cause of the disease is considered the combination of several factors:
- aging;
- heredity (genetic predisposition);
- some toxins and substances.
Other causes of Parkinson's disease include:
- viral infections leading to postencephalitic parkinsonism;
- cerebral atherosclerosis;
- heavy and repeated head injuries.
Symptoms
In spite of its relatively slow developmentParkinson's disease refers to progressive diseases with striking manifestations indicating the later stages, as in primary forms it is probableto treat latently.
Overall up to 8 stages of Parkinson's diseasewith progressive clinical manifestations are distinguished: from the absence of overt symptoms until complete immobilization of the patient. To assess the condition of the particular patient they use a specially designed scale.
Among the symptoms of the disease are as follows:
- slow movements of limbs;
- difficulty or disappearance of mimic activity;
- increased muscle tone;
- stoop;
- pain of varying intensity;
- specific tremor (shaking), decreasing or disappearing completely in movement;
- difficulty or disappearance of posture control (frequent falling, gait changes etc.);
- speech changes;
- bladder dysfunction;
- chronic depression.
A patient suffering from even the initial form of the disease needs a professional examination and recommendations of individual course of treatment as otherwise it can leadto serious consequences. There is a kind of flexion posture: head and torso are bent forward, arms are bent, often tightly to the body, legs bent at the knee.
The gait is characterized by small shuffling steps. Sometimes complete immobility manifests itself. Often there is a tendency to involuntary running forward: when the patient is pushed forward, he runs to keep from falling as if catching his center of gravity.Speech becomes quiet, monotonous, without modulation, with a tendency to decay at the end of the phrase. Many patients complain of difficulty in getting up of bed and turning in bed during the night which essentially violates not only the quality of a night's sleep but also, as a result, the usefulness of daytime wakefulness.
- Stereotactic neurostimulation of deep structures of the brain
