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The recently concluded PAN Conference in Washington DC, Sunday included a session Moderated by Morton Kondrake of the PAN Board of Directors. The panel included a representative from Novartis. Please forgive me but the Program didn't identify him. Like the other two panelists from NeoPharma and Schwarz, Novartis has developed formulations to deal with the ON-OFF phenomena in advanced Parkinson's. In a majority of cases, newly diagnosed patients respond well to carbidopa/levodopa. As more and more neurons die in the synapse, wearing off is observed before the next dose. With this wearing off there is anxiety. Carbidopa inhibits an enzyme that interferes in the levodopa passing the blood-brain barrier. Only about 10% of the levodopa ever reaches the brain. Several years ago, researchers identified another enzyme that also blocks levodopa. The enzyme is COMT. Several drugs were developed to inhibit COMT. Tasmar and Comtan and later entacapone were developed. With these inhibitors, about 40% of the levodopa reaches the brain Another problem with advanced PD is polypharmacy. What if you mix your pills up? Novartis has answered all of these problems with Stavelo. Stavelo, combines carbidopa/levodopa, entacapone in one small tablet. With better dosing, anxiety is decreased. Another Parkinson's issue is the short amount of time you have with your movements disorder neurologist. Novartis recommends keeping a detailed diary that you can present to the doctor on a visit so that your dosing can be adjusted to how you are doing rather than talking about your garden and the weather and wasting the opportunity to receive help. To learn more: http://www.stalevo.com/info/answers/hcp_checklist.jsp?checked=y John Cottingham ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn