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I watched the Canadian Documentary: "The Parkinson's Enigma" last night. For those in Canada who missed it, it will be shown again on the Canadian Discovery channel on: Thu, Apr 11, 2002 at 9:00 PM Fri, Apr 12, 2002 at 2:00 AM Fri, Apr 12, 2002 at 3:00 PM I don't know if it will be shown in future on American channels. Maybe people should write to the American Discovery Channel and PBS and see if they can get it. Here is a link to the Canadian Discovery channel website with more information. http://www.discovery.ca/stories/2002/04/05/51.asp I would imagine the reason the show was produced in Canada was because there is a distinct Canadian angle to it. It started out discussing the strange coincidence of 4 people coming down with Parkinson Disease who all worked on the set of a Canadian TV series "Leo & Me" in the late 1970's. The most famous of these 4 people is Michael J. Fox. Four researchers were interviewed throughout the show as well as Michael J. Fox and Sally Gardner, one of the other 3 people from the tv series with Parkinson's. The researchers interviewed were: Dr. Donald Calne, neurologist and director of the Neurodegenerative Disorders Centre at Vancouver Hospital and Health Sciences Centre, University of British Columbia. Dr. Calne's research on the single event hypothesis for the cause of Parkinson Disease was the main focus of the show. Read his research paper at http://www.bcma.org/BCMJ/April2001/PDSyndrome.asp and you'll see the main points discussed in the later half of the article. Dr. Jon Stoessl, professor of neurology, University of British Columbia Dr. Oliver Sacks, clinical professor of neurology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York. Dr. Sacks is best known for his book and subsequent movie called "Awakenings" which starred Robert De Niro and Robin Williams. See: http://www.oliversacks.com/awakenings.html Dr. William Langston, President of the Parkinson's Institute, Sunnyvalle, California Dr. Langston is also the co-author of "The Case of the Frozen Addicts", a book which describes the discovery of MPTP. The toxic effects of MPTP were also discussed in the documentary. You can read some background on MPTP toxicity causing parkinsonism at http://www.the-scientist.com/yr1988/dec/research5_881212.html The show discussed past cases of parkinsonism caused by a virus or exposure to toxins. In the movie "Awakenings", patients had contracted viral encephalitis which left them bed-ridden in a sleep-like state. When they were given L-Dopa (the parkinson's medication) they miraculously recovered movement. Researchers have also injected the influenza virus directly into the brains of mice and the dopamine producing neurons were killed off. This research seemed to show that for some reason the substantia nigra region of the brain is a target for viruses. There were cases of severe parkinsonism occurring overnight in California in the early 80's. Six cases were reported where people had taken a dose of what they thought was pure heroin. It turned out to be an overcooked batch of synthetic heroin which formed a simple molecule called MPTP which is severely toxic to dopamine producing neurons in the substantia nigra region of the brain. These people became bedridden overnight, unable to move. L-Dopa did not help them significantly but one of the patients later received fetal cell transplant surgery and recovered enough to be able to ride a bicycle... he was shown on the program on his bike. This case proved to scientists that neural cell transplants could work. Stem cell research was also mentioned on the program as having great hope for the future. Dr. Donald Calne's theory is that parkinsons may be caused by a single event... either an exposure to a virus that attacks brain cells or to a neurotoxin. At the time of the exposure many neurons die immediately and others get sick but maintain some function. Then in future there may be no futher exposure to toxins and apparent recovery from the virus. Nerve cells that were damaged though continue to slowly die off. Eventually enough dopamine producing cells die off that symptoms begin to appear.. in many people it starts off with a strange twitch or a tremor. Dr. Calne thinks that this slow dying off of cells gives the appearance that Parkinson's is an ongoing disease process when it could actually be the result of this past single exposure to a toxin or virus. He also believes that certain occupations are more prone to developing Parkinson's. Teachers, medical workers, loggers and miners were all mentioned with the theory being that there might be a respiratory virus that could make these groups of people more susceptible. Parkinson's is known to be less common in people who do not work outside the home. The theory is very interesting and was backed up by the other researchers interviewed who all said studying these coincidental clusters of Parkinson's was greatly adding to their knowledge of the disease. Multiple System Atrophy was not mentioned in the show. Regards, Pam Please join the Multiple System Atrophy/Shy-Drager mailing list at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/shydrager ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn