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Continued - Making Progress Against Parkinson's Because some patients don't respond to levodopa, researchers have been developing other drugs to add to the arsenal. Medications initially tested at Baylor include the potent anti-oxidant deprenyl, known by the trade name Selegiline. Deprenyl is part of a group of neuro-protective therapies that work by blocking an enzyme to prevent the process that leads to the destruction of brain cells. Among other studies, the Baylor center is doing early tests on an unnamed drug referred to as AMG474, which has been shown in animal tests to improve the symptoms and reverse some degeneration. When medications fail to correct symptoms, patients in the past have opted for two types of surgeries that work by creating lesions in the brain to stop tremors. Complications include strokes and seizures, leading to many Parkinson's specialists to abandon the procedures. A new surgical therapy without those complications is deep-brain stimulation, in which electrodes are implanted into the brain to stimulate the cells, much like a cardiac pacemaker stimulates the heart. The electrodes are connected by thin wires to a small pulse generator implanted under the skin in the upper chest. Deep-brain stimulation is available at Baylor. At one point in Martone's illness, the tremors caused her head to wobble dramatically and her arms to flail uncontrollably. Martone and her husband, Bob, felt it was time for surgical intervention, trying an unsuccessful experimental adrenal gland transplant in 1989. Two lesion-type surgeries in 1995 resulted in much greater improvements. Within an hour of being moved to intensive care, she was on her feet walking around for the first time in years. Most recently, Martone has developed another symptom of Parkinson's which makes her stoop so much, that it has impaired her balance. Like Fox, Martone tried to hide her condition for a number of years - sitting on her hand to hide tremors - but she and her husband have now become open advocates for those with the disease. The couple hass traveled to Washington, D.C., to lobby for more funding, and Bob Martone is president of the Houston Area Parkinson Society, a nonprofit organization that raise research money and provides support to patients. On June 27, Nancy Martone rceived an award for her work from the Micahel J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research. Continued ---