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Hello,

I am happy to have found this list. Reading other messages I can tell already
that this is a wonderful place to receive information and support.  A quick
introduction:
  My mother, age 79, has had Parkinsons for about 7/8 years now. She has managed
her condition well until recently, but I have gradually had to assume more of
her care and have become an active participant in helping her try to manage her
Parkinsons. At the moment we are at kind of a low point which is very
frustrating for her and me also.

She is now at a point where her medications [sinemet(25/100 3 X per pay and CR 4
X per day) and eldepryl (once a day] are no longer very effective and she is
hoping for help from newer medications. Her situation is complicated by her high
blood pressure for which she has taken medication for about 20 years. The doctor
calls her type of blood pressure labile, meaning it goes up and down all the
time. However, it was being managed within an acceptable range. She started on
mirapex last fall, but as time went by her blood pressure began to fluctuate.
She was taking mirapex 3X per day, gradually increasing the dosage. What she
found was that after taking her noon dose her blood pressure would drop rapidly,
and then rise gradually through the afternoon, and sometimes get too high in the
evening. Her doctor (who is not a neurologist) was convinced that the mirapex
was causing her fluctuations in BP through the day. We were not convinced that
it was the culprit because her BP did not dive after her morning and evening
dose, only at noon, and in fact would rise in the evening after taking the
mirapex. The doctor reduced her blood pressure medication because it was going
so low, but it continued to get too high at times.  She had a couple of TIAs
accompanied with numbness, headaches, confusion, and then 2 weeks ago ended up
in the emergency room with a near stroke and week's hospitalization, from which
she has emerged with no apparent effects except extreme weakness (and terrible
memories of the hallucinations she experienced there). However, she has not
taken mirapex since she went into the hospital, which probably partly accounts
for some of her weakness, and she is on her old routine. She was having a good
energy boost with mirapex and felt much better during her "good" times.
 She has been home from the hospital for about 2 weeks and her blood pressure is
still leaping around dropping so low at times that she can barely move and then
going high at other times. She is taking more BP medications now, but it is
still not keeping it in an acceptable range.  Her neurologist has left the BP
problem to her other doctor to work on (suggesting she hold off on restaring
mirapex), and her other doctor has essentially tossed in the towel on
controlling her blood pressure and has now referred her to a kidney specialist.

After that long winded introduction (sorry) my question is rather short. I know
others have had trouble with lowering of BP with mirapex, but has anyone ever
experienced such fluctuations in BP while taking it?  We are sort of at a
standstill, going to one doctor who sends us to the next, and in the meantime
she barely gets around in the day, can't sleep at night and has difficultry
concentrating on the simplest tasks, and I think is getting increasing
depressed.

Any comments, suggestions offered would be appreciated. I also just appreciate
having a place where I can even discuss this!! Thanks in advance for any help.

Jan