Maryse, I posted an abbreviated version of this. from Diane Wysak.  If I
don't the "List" rejects it if it is too long.  It is strange...I have a MA,
good thing I didn't go for the PhD when I had the chance at UCLA.  However,
my grandfather who had PD didn't graduate from the 8th grade.  He was a
self-taught mechanic.  Maybe it is too much work for the brain ....Ray
----- Original Message -----
From: "M.Schild" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 22, 2005 7:17 AM
Subject: weird


> Newswise — Mayo Clinic researchers have found that an individual’s
> educational
> and career paths impact Parkinson’s disease risk later in life. This
> report
> will appear in the Nov. 22 issue of the journal Neurology,
> http://www.aan.com/publications/journal/index.cfm.
> The investigators, led by Walter Rocca, M.D., a Mayo Clinic
> epidemiologist,
> discovered the highest increase in Parkinson’s risk in people with nine or
> more years of education. They also found that risk level rises as years of
> schooling increase. Occupationally, physicians had the greatest increased
> risk for Parkinson’s compared to the general population, while those
> employed
> as construction and extractive workers (e.g., miners, well drillers),
> production workers (e.g., machine operators, fabricators), metalworkers
> and
> engineers had the lowest risk increase. The researchers also note that
> this
> study did not find farmers and other agricultural workers at increased
> risk
> for Parkinson’s.
> The Mayo Clinic investigators advise caution in interpreting this study.
> “Our
> findings for education and occupation are complex, and therefore they need
> to
> be interpreted with care,” says Roberta Frigerio, M.D., the study’s first
> author and former Mayo Clinic research fellow. “These factors may be
> surrogates for a variety of exposures, physical activity, personality or
> socioeconomic status. Further studies are needed to interpret our
> findings.”
> Demetrius (Jim) Maraganore, M.D., Mayo Clinic neurologist and study
> investigator, agrees. “We really can’t say from this study that education
> and
> occupation are causal factors in Parkinson’s disease; we can only say that
> they are associated,” says Dr. Maraganore. “I don’t think that schooling
> or
> wearing a stethoscope causes brain cells to degenerate or that digging
> holes
> with a digger protects your brain cells from atrophy, but I think that
> these
> are indirect indicators of factors that may relate to brain degeneration.
> And
> now what we need to do is use these clues to try and identify those
> molecular
> level events that differentiate these people.”
> Suggested Applications of Study Findings
> The utility of the study’s findings concerning occupation, education and
> Parkinson’s disease risk is primarily informational rather than actionable
> for members of the public, according to Dr. Maraganore. This is especially
> true in light of the relatively low overall lifetime risk for Parkinson’s
> for
> any given person, he says.
> “Really, nobody should do anything differently based on these findings,”
> says
> Dr. Maraganore. “These findings are not at all intended to change anybody’s
> behaviors. I think that the bottom line is that we’re talking about going
> from a baseline risk of 2 percent to develop Parkinson’s disease during a
> lifetime to a risk of 4 percent if you are highly educated or a physician,
> or
> 1 percent if you are less educated or more physically active. So, I wouldn’t
> change your schooling plans or your occupation based on these findings. I
> would just welcome these findings as new clues about possible causes of
> Parkinson’s disease that will hopefully lead to the ultimate answers.”
> Dr. Maraganore also notes that the study’s findings should be reassuring
> to
> farmers, welders or other metalworkers, who were not found in this study
> to
> be at increased risk for Parkinson’s due to their occupations, in contrast
> to
> previous studies.
> Potential Explanations of the Study’s Findings
> The researchers explain that the increased Parkinson’s risk found for
> physicians and more educated individuals could be partly explained by
> earlier
> recognition and detection of the disease, in addition to better access to
> specialized medical care. However, nonphysicians and physicians in the
> study
> had a similar time between onset of symptoms and diagnosis of Parkinson’s,
> which would speak against increased recognition of the disease due to
> education or profession.
> The explanation for the four occupational groups found to have a reduced
> risk
> of Parkinson’s compared to the general population also remains uncertain,
> according to the investigators. The findings may be due to chance, some
> bias
> due to higher nonparticipation rate in the telephone interview portion of
> the
> study among these occupational groups, or to confounding due to lower
> education and resulting decreased recognition of Parkinson’s. Occupation
> may
> be a surrogate for physical activity level in the findings, leading to a
> higher risk in more sedentary professions such as physicians and lower
> risk
> in service occupations which involve greater motor skills use. The study
> investigators emphasize that these associations do not imply causality,
> however. Physical activity (recreation or work related) may protect
> against
> Parkinson’s disease, but it is also possible that people predisposed to
> develop Parkinson’s disease avoid strenuous activity earlier in life.
> Dr. Maraganore explains that early Parkinson’s disease could account for
> some
> of the educational and occupational risk findings. “It could be that
> people
> with Parkinson’s disease have premorbid personalities that make them like
> education,” he says. “For example, dopamine is the reward chemical in the
> brain and is deficient in the brains of people with Parkinson’s disease.
> So,
> if you have a long-standing deficiency of dopamine, you may be less likely
> to
> party and more likely to sit at your desk and study. So, in these ways
> early,
> undetected disease can subtly shape your pattern of behaviors, giving the
> impression that education is a risk factor for the disease when in fact it’s
> really an early manifestation.”
> How the Study Was Conducted
> In this study, the researchers identified medical records of all
> individuals
> who had developed Parkinson’s from 1976 to 1995 in Olmsted County, Minn.,
> home of Mayo Clinic. All Parkinson’s patients were then matched to someone
> similar in age and gender who did not have Parkinson’s. The investigators
> collected information about education and occupations from a medical
> record
> review and also a telephone interview with the study individuals, using
> the
> 1980 Standard Occupational Classification to code each person’s
> profession.
>
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