Samantha - I thought of another test for Parkinson's tremor vs. familial
tremor or other types: Does Joe's tremor resemble a pill-rolling motion?
(Try this motion yourself by rapidly circling your thumb around the balls of
your index and middle fingers. The thumb only has to be near or lightly
brush the fingers). The pill-rolling tremor is Parkinson's and doesn't occur
in other types of tremors.
Also, does he have a resting tremor OR a tremor that is active when
he's trying to drink a glass of water or perform any other task? The
Parkinson's tremor is called a resting tremor because it usually stops while
the hand is engaged in some kind of task. (You probably know all of this,
but it seemed worth mentioning). Familial tremor occurs mostly during the use
of the hand, but not while the hand is at rest.
As for Parkinson's occurring in families or not - yes, it does happen,
but probably not as often as it happens that there is no one else in the
family who was ever diagnosed with it. We have a friend with Parkinson's
whose father also had it, and we have another friend (from a family of 11
children) who, along with two of her sisters, was diagnosed with Parkinson's
in her forties. But, with Joe's mother having it, there could be a tendency
for a doctor to leap to that conclusion without carefully considering the
symptoms.
I'm concerned that there wasn't a marked response to the medication in
terms of decrease of tremors. I say, hie thee to Atlanta for a good
evaluation! And keep us posted. Margie (again) Lawrence, Kansas
