Message-ID: <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 06 Jun 2001 04:33:02 -0700
From: "J. R. Bruman" <[log in to unmask]>
Reply-To: [log in to unmask]
Organization: -
X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0 (Win95; I)
MIME-Version: 1.0
To:
Parkinson's Information Exchange Network <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re:
References: <001001c0ee37$3b4407a0$12e21a3f@ftc>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
war wrote:
>
> I have recently become romantically involved with someone who has PD and I am trying to find out as much as I possibly can about it.
>
> My question to anyone out there is this. Although he has a very mentally taxing and detail oriented job which he is extremely good at, I find that when he is "off duty" he has a hard time staying focused. He acknowledges that although never diagnosed he believes he had ADD before being diagnosed with PD seven years ago but he is unable to say whether this "condition" has become worse with the onset of PD or not.
>
> Can anyone enlighten me on this. And any suggestions on how to deal and help with it would be much appreciated.
>
> By the way, I only joined here two days ago and already I am very impressed by it and know that it will be extremely helpful to me.
>
Yes! Although PD was first described and viewed as a movement
disorder, in the past decade or so there has been growing evidence
and awareness that psychological effects are equally important.
This becomes noticeable when in the general progress of PD the
patient enters the "fluctuating" stage, where "on" and "off"
conditions are synchronous with the intermittent scheduled dosage
of dopamine-enhancing drugs (such as Sinemet). The sudden and acute
"mood swings" of the fluctuating stage are common and well-known,
but the deep depression of the "off" phase is often mistaken for
more general clinical depression which is responsive to antidepressants
such as Prozac or Zoloft. And I can attest, "off" is associated
very perceptibly with impairment of higher cognitive function such
as memory, judgement, and reasoning ability, but the impairment
vanishes as soon as the next succeeding dose of PD meds takes
effect. Cheers,
Joe
--
J. R. Bruman (818) 789-3694
3527 Cody Road
Sherman Oaks, CA 91403-5013
