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What Is Parkinson’s Disease? Symptoms, Causes, Treatments

Parkinson's disease affects the body's ability to move and control balance, a degenerative form of the central nervous system. When the disease progresses to a serious stage, it will affect the patient's health. So how to treat this pathology and have any signs to recognize early or not?

What is Parkinson's Disease?

What is Parkinson's disease? Parkinson's disease is one of the diseases related to nerves, a group of disorders of movement. The disease occurs when groups of cells begin to degenerate in the brain, unable to control the movement of muscles, causing the patient to stiffen the muscles, abnormal posture, and gait, slow movement.

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Parkinson's disease is a common neurological disease in the elderly

If the disease progresses to a late stage, the treatment process becomes difficult, especially nerve cells severely affected, and dopamine deficiency, loss of physical motor function.

Can Parkinson's disease be cured? Although the medical industry has made great progress today, there is still no effective method to completely cure Parkinson's disease. The main treatment regimens proposed are to help patients with Parkinson's disease possibly slow the progression of the disease, improve quality of life.

Causes of Parkinson's Disease

Up to the present time, the exact cause of Parkinson's disease has not been found. But scientists believe that Parkinson's disease is strongly related due to the interaction between external environmental factors that influence the body's genetic susceptibility.

Is Parkinson's disease inherited? Parkinson's disease is common mainly in the elderly, rarely occurs in young people. Although experts have found many genetic defects that cause Parkinson's disease, which may provide a basis for a deeper understanding of the pathology, this is only a small number in the vast majority of cases without hereditary.

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Genetic Parkinson's disease accounts for a relatively low rate

However, with such random cases, especially in young people, it is very likely that relatives of Parkinson's disease patients are also at higher risk of Parkinson's disease than normal families. This rate accounts for about 4-5%.

For people with Parkinson's disease, it has been found that the amount of Dopamine in their body is significantly reduced. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that helps transmit signals connecting between nerve fibers in the human brain, often concentrated in the basal ganglia, playing an important role in the movement, coordinate between flexible body movements.

If brain cells degenerate over time, it will reduce or lose the ability to produce Dopamine normally, causing the body to seriously deficient in Dopamine, making it difficult to move.

In addition, there are factors that increase the risk of Parkinson's disease, including:

• Age: The natural aging process can cause a decrease in Dopamine, which is common in the elderly.

• Environment: When exposed to a toxic environment such as pesticides, herbicides, unsafe conditions increase the risk of disease higher than others.

• After trauma: People with traumatic brain injury, after the treatment process also increases the risk of disease.

• Genetics: Although this factor accounts for a low rate, but if someone in the family randomly has this disease, the remaining members are also at high risk.

Parkinson's Disease Symptoms

In the early stages, Parkinson's disease usually presents only symptoms on one side of the body, causing the patient to feel tired, the movements are no longer flexible as usual. As the disease enters a more severe stage, symptoms will begin to clear up, all over the body.

Personality changes: The brain is an important organ, the place that is mainly responsible for controlling human activities and thinking, as well as situations, perception … So if there is any change Any personality change could also be an early sign of Parkinson's disease.

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Typical signs of Parkinson's disease

Slow movements: One of the typical signs of Parkinson's disease that you can recognize is that the coordination of musculoskeletal movements becomes sluggish, such as when changing positions, turning, when using the handle … the movement takes place at a very slow speed, no longer as flexible as before.

The sense of taste is reduced: When you have Parkinson's disease, in the early stages, it will affect the olfactory function, causing the patient's ability to distinguish the scent of food, this condition will become more serious if not treated early.

There are problems related to the intestinal tract: Parkinson's disease people often experience some digestive problems such as indigestion, bloating, constipation, which are common in the elderly.

Feeling pain in the shoulder: Pain in the shoulder is usually prolonged, easily confused with another osteoarthritis, but the difference is that when medical intervention or medication still shows no signs of remission. Immediately thinking of Parkinson's disease.

Change in some habits in living: It can be clearly seen that this change is often seen in voice, irritability, mood swings, and writing signs also have signs of change.

Fatigue: Frequent feeling of prolonged fatigue, loss of concentration, and other signs that may indicate early signs of Parkinson's disease.

When the disease has progressed to a severe stage, the patient will begin to appear other signs such as Shivering when resting, often encountering hands, feet, mouth, tongue … contracting muscles, tightening, causing difficulty in movement. , facial muscle paralysis, sleep disturbance, body imbalance, sometimes fainting occurs …

How Long Does Parkinson's Disease Live?

How long can Parkinson's disease live? Parkinson's disease usually gets worse over time. Although the disease is not the direct cause threatening the patient's life, there are many studies showing that the disease can affect the patient's longevity.

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Parkinson's disease, if treated early, will prolong life and improve the condition well

Currently, there is no exact figure confirming the lifetime of people with Parkinson's disease. This issue depends on many factors such as the duration of the disease, the progression of the disease, and the accompanying diseases such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes …

However, if the disease is detected at an early stage, actively treated, and followed the instructions of the doctor, the sufferer can still maintain a stable quality of life for a time that can last up to 10 – 20 years.

How is Parkinson's Disease Treated?

If the disease progresses in an advanced stage that can lead to disability, it should be properly treated and taken according to the doctor's orders at an early stage and keep optimistic to slow the progression of the disease.

Some of the methods used in the treatment of Parkinson's disease are as follows:

Drug treatment

Your doctor may prescribe a number of drugs used in the treatment of Parkinson's disease such as:

• Drugs that act as a substitute for dopamine: This is a drug that promptly replenishes dopamine to the body such as Sydopa, Madopar … but during the use of the drug should not be combined with vitamin B6.

• Dopamine agonists: These are drugs that directly stimulate the dopamine receptors.

• Drugs that inhibit catabolism dopamine: Usually these drugs must be imported and available in Vietnam in small quantities.

• Anticholinergic drugs.

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Patients with Parkinson's disease are treated with medications that help to improve their condition

For the use of any medicine, the patient should follow the prescription of the doctor in the appropriate dosage. When there are any side effects such as heart palpitations, feeling of dry mouth, abdominal pain, allergies … should immediately notify the doctor for appropriate adjustment.

Surgery

In the case of ineffective drug treatment, the doctor will prescribe surgery such as electric stimulation of the black sickle area – sports, neural tissue transplantation, positioning surgery … depending on the specific condition. can.

Rehabilitation

One of the treatments for Parkinson's disease is rehabilitation such as:

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Yoga practice works very well in the treatment of Parkinson's disease

• Physical therapy improves mobility and reduces balance disturbances in the patient.

• Use speech therapy: Help improve speech and swallow better.

• Do exercises that enhance endurance, good for health such as yoga, yoga, tai chi to help improve the ability to move slowly.

Diet for people with Parkinson's disease

What should Parkinson's disease eat? In addition to drug treatment, rehabilitation exercises, nutrition is also extremely important for people with Parkinson's disease.

The patient should be fully supplemented with nutrients and diverse diets. In particular, it is important to focus on adding more vegetables, fruits, and whole grains to the diet, because these are rich in vitamins, especially vitamin C, vitamin D, fiber and reduce oxidation, help health, brain cells function better, increasing dopamine production.

In addition, the foods that have anti-inflammatory effects, rich in omega 3 are also very beneficial to help prevent and improve Parkinson's disease, which is abundant in fish such as mackerel, salmon, and tuna … Drink green tea, Black bean juice also contains many beneficial antioxidants that patients should consult and supplement.

Thus, Parkinson's disease causes a lot of impact on the patient's quality of life, limiting movement and making movements no longer as flexible as before.

When detecting early symptoms related to Parkinson's disease, the patient should not be subjective, needing early diagnosis and treatment to the hospital to help improve the condition and improve longevity, as well as overcome the symptoms that the disease causes.

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The site cannot and does not contain medical advice. The medical information is provided for general informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional advice. Accordingly, before taking any actions based upon such information, we encourage you to consult with the appropriate professionals.