First Saturday as the World Turns

Parkinson’s disease

By Ed Rogers

As is the case in most things, we never really pay serious attention to diseases until we are confronted with them personally. That is how it was with my wife and me. Things were going along just fine. Then her right hand began to shake.
    Parkinson’s disease is not uncommon: There are over one million Americans who live with Parkinson’s disease. This surpasses the number of people diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, and Lou Gehrig’s disease combined.
    Each year nearly 60,000 Americans are told they have Parkinson’s. The number would be higher if not for the thousands of cases that go undetected or misdiagnosed.
    Worldwide there are 10 million people with Parkinson’s disease. Four per cent of these are under 50 years of age.
    The only true upside to Parkinson’s disease (from now on I will refer to it as PD) is that it does not shorten a person’s life. The battle then becomes one not of survival but of quality of life.

The person with PD joins a list of very well-known names:
    Pope John Paul II, the second-longest serving Pope in history, was dedicated to health and fitness. He even insisted that a swimming pool be built in the Vatican. His predecessor, Pope John Paul I, died of a heart attack only 33 days after becoming Pope. However, Pope John Paul II survived two assassination attempts and various health scares. The Vatican confirmed in 2003 that he suffered from PD. His reign lasted over 26 years before when he died of sepsis in 2005, at the age of 84.
    Linda Ronstadt. Eleven-time Grammy Award-winning singer Linda Ronstadt revealed to AARP in 2013 that PD had silenced her. Though she was still able to speak, the disease left the then 67-year-old singer of “You’re No Good” and “Don’t Know Much” without a singing voice. Ronstadt said she initially believed her symptoms were due to an insect bite and shoulder surgery.
    Janet Reno. In 1995, while serving as the Attorney General of the United States under President Bill Clinton, Reno announced that she had been diagnosed with PD. She stayed in office until 2011. Since leaving office, she has become an advocate for PD research.
    Estelle Getty. In 2000, the actress best known for her role as Sophia on The Golden Girls announced she had been suffering from PD for several years. Getty eventually passed away in 2008 from natural causes.
    Billy Graham, the evangelist pastor, announced in 1992 that he has PD. Today, at age 93, Graham continues to act as pastor to the President in a role he has fulfilled for many years, despite the illness.
    Johnny Cash. In 1997, the country singer/songwriter announced he was battling PD. Despite his illness, Cash enjoyed a late-career resurgence before his death in 2003.
    Michael J. Fox. Most famous for his role as Marty McFly in the Back to the Future movies, Fox was diagnosed with young-onset PD in 1991 at the age of 30. He went public with his diagnosis in 1998 and committed himself to working for Parkinson’s research. He eventually established the Michael J. Fox Foundation, which raises money for research.
    Muhammad Ali. The boxing champion began showing signs of PD shortly after retiring from boxing in 1981 and was diagnosed with the disease in 1984, at the age of 42. Though his doctors are not entirely sure, Ali's PD may be the result of repeated blows to the head during boxing matches.

Those are but a few of the thousands of people dealing with this disease. Most fight their battles in the shadows. Some, like Fox, are trying to find a way to stop or at least slow the progress of the disease. The best drug to date, however, was invented in 1935.
    The cause of PD is unknown. It attacks the center of the brain, where certain nerve cells called neurons break down or die. By the time the signs of PD present themselves the person has lost 50% of these neurons. They release a chemical messenger called dopamine. When the level of dopamine goes down, this is when the symptoms of PD can be seen.
    The signs start on one side of the body at first. Most people notice the hand shaking by itself. Getting up from a chair is harder and walking becomes unsteady. There are medicines that help these problems. However, PD is not the same in each person, and the medicines may react differently from one person to another. PD is a progressive disease that cannot be cured. The best to hope for is to slow the effects of PD on the body and allow the person to live as normally as possible.
    We moved to Costa Rica with the idea of spending our declining years laying on beaches and listening to jungle sounds through the night. With Janie’s PD we now face the fact that our time in this beautiful country will be cut short. How short will depend on the progress of the disease. A time will come when she will need more than we are able to get in Costa Rica, and then we’ll have to say goodbye.
    Until that day we plan to live Pura Vida.
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Copyright © 2014 by Ed Rogers

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