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Dear listmembers, Isend this mail with some doubt, because the storm seems to have subsided, but I think the desease of the list is not really cured and is serious enough to give some attention and think about a proper diagnosis. Many people think that the current problems are not different from problems in the past. The discussion about the suitable content of mails did break out with a certain regularity as long as I am a member (more than 4 years now). Also this has been the cause of animosity between members in the past. But the symptom of many new members leaving the list after a short time is a new and much more serious symptom. I agree with Dennis Green, who said the list is changed beyond recognition. It is my impression that this change is not in the first place caused by the many non PD mails but by the lack of enough interesting PD mails. A sign that convincingly illustrates this is for example the amazing fact that on the list nobody has asked Dennis how he is doing after his new surgery in september this year. Such a negligence did not happen in the past. (So I ask it now: "How do you do after your STN surgery, Dennis?"). Also the reactions to new members are less than they used to be. Why is that so? I can of course only speak for myself in this respect. A reason that I am much less active on the list is, that I feel frequently that the only thing I have to contribute is something I said already more than once. For example: the dystonia discussion which showed up on the list some time ago. It was provoked by the message of a new member "Yvonne". She worried about her husband who had recently started to use sinemet and suffered from dystonia. The neurologist said this was caused by a to high level of sinemet intake. The patient himself thought it was on the contrary caused by a to low level of sinemet, because it happened when "off". In the past I used to interfere in a discussion like that, pointing out that the apparent paradox of a symptom induced by leva-dopa, but showing up when off, is no paradox at all but a "wearing off" symptom. In the same way as "cold turkey" symptoms of a heroin addict can be conceived as being caused by a to high intake of heroin (in the past) and a to low intake (during the last hours). But I now feel an aversion, writing about that to the list again. Yielding to that aversion, I fail in giving the member in question the information he/she is entitled to. In the past I solved this problem a few times by sending a message to the private e-mailadress of the person involved. If my impression is right, that more of the list-members that used to be active have let themselves be silenced by a same kind of experience, it would make sense to think about how new members can be helped to turn into active participants themselves by using a kind of group-cohesion, before they leave. One rather simple measure, and the only one I can think up myself at the moment, would be to explicitly ask every new memeber to read some basic, forwarded, info about Parkinson and put any question that this text or his symptoms in general give rise to. It should be up to the members to see these questions get answered. Maybe my diagnosis is only founded on inadequately generalizing my own feelings. But even than the run-away reaction of newcomers is an alarming sign. Ida Yvonne, if you are interested in much more information about "wearing off" symptoms, please send me your e-mail adress, because I seem to have lost your message to the list. Kind regards / Vriendelijke groeten Ida Kamphuis