For anyone coming here for the first time, and needing some answers on self-help, especially with regard to maintaining flexibility John Argue's book 'Parkinson's Disease and the Art of Moving' is a good resource. Based on both western and eastern ideas on body work it takes you through a process of developing skills that will help you keep your independence, and minimise some of the movement difficulties that PD brings. In case you think I am giving this book some good advertising space, I have never had anything to do with John Argue, just recognise a good thing when I see it!

Tai Chi is also pretty good, and one of the forms of exercise that comes recommended for PD'ers. Look for a teacher who is non competitive and will take things at an easy pace........... A good teacher will help you get your stance right early on, and teach you to step out using a heel-toe movement, which helps with falls and poor balance, getting out of hesitation and freezes etc. It's relaxing and good fun, and helps maintain good memory too ....

Lindy

...at least for me.
There are supplements and there are supplements and one can go quite mad and poor trying to take all of them that show promise. Plus, it gets downright awful to be taking pills and pills and pills.

But some of them do a lot of good and here are the best that I have tried. I suggest that newbies adopt a simple test to see if these or any others are worth taking. Stand on one foot as long as you can by making several attempts and then write down your time. Repeat on your other foot. This simple test gives you a baseline on half-a-dozen PD parameters. After trying a new supplement or therapy, repeat the testing. While it won't tell you much about longterm benefits, it helps tremendously with benefits to daily function.

In my case the following pair TRIPLED my times in one week and there is some good research to back them up.

Alpha Lipoic Acid (ALA) and Acetyl-L-Carnitine (ALC) work both together and seperately to address some core problems of PD. Inflammation, oxidation, and mitochondrial problems are very destructive processes at work in PWP.

ALA is one of the most important anti-oxidants around for two reasons. It crosses the blood brain barrier for one. And it not only neutralizes the free radicals that damage nerve tissues, it also is critical to recycling other anti-oxidants like Vit E and Vit C.

ALC has at least two things going for it. It boosts mitochondrial function for one. Secondly and even more interestingly, it increases the diameter of remaining neurons and makes them more efficient and able to partly compensate for the ones lost.

The third and final part of the team is green tea extract. it has many benefits but one stands out for PWP. One of the things that kills our neurons is an over-reaction of our brain's immune system. The defenders are a cell-type called the microglia. In PD, when microglia are "activated" they just don't know when to quit and destroy neurons around themselves. The substantia nigra has the greatest microglial density in the brain. Green tea's ingredients calm down the microglial reaction and stop the slaughter.

From: Altern Med Rev. 2006 Sept;11(3):232-237.

Alpha-lipoic acid- Monograph.

[No authors listed]

Alpha-lipoic acid (ALA - also known as thioctic acid) was discovered in 1951 as
a molecule that assists in acyl-group transfer and as a coenzyme in the Krebs
cycle. In the 1980s, the scientific community realized alpha-lipoic acid is a
powerful antioxidant. Several qualities distinguish alpha-lipoic acid from other
antioxidants: ALA can be synthesized by animals and humans; it neutralizes free
radicals in both the fatty and watery regions of cells, in contrast to vitamin C
(water soluble) and vitamin E (fat soluble); and, ALA functions as an
antioxidant in both its reduced and oxidized forms.

Mechanisms of Action
Alpha-lipoic acid is a potent antioxidant in both fat- and water-soluble mediums. Furthermore, its antioxi-
dant activity extends to both its oxidized and reduced forms. DHLA is capable of directly regenerating ascorbic
acid from dehydroascorbic acid and indirectly regenerating vitamin E. Researchers have also found ALA increases
intracellular glutathione and coenzyme Q levels.
Alpha-lipoic acid appears capable of chelating certain metals. It forms stable complexes with copper, man-
ganese, and zinc. In animal studies, it has been found to protect against arsenic poisoning, and, in both animal
and in vitro studies, ALA reduced cadmium-induced hepatotoxicity. In vitro, ALA chelated mercury from renal
slices.



1: J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2003 Nov;58(11):970-4.

Carnitine: a neuromodulator in aged rats.

Juliet PA, Balasubramaniam D, Balasubramaniam N, Panneerselvam C.

Department of Geriatrics, Nagoya University School of Medicine, Japan.

A wide range of morphological and biochemical changes occur in the central
nervous system with increasing age. L-carnitine, a naturally occurring compound,
plays a vital role in fatty acid transport across the mitochondrial membrane.
L-carnitine (300 mg/kg body wt/day) was administered intraperitoneally to young
and old male Wistar rats for 7, 14, and 21 days. Carnitine, dopamine,
epinephrine, and serotonin levels were assayed in discrete regions of the brain.
Carnitine supplementation increased the levels of dopamine, epinephrine, and
serotonin in the experimental animals in our study. Response to carnitine
supplementation varied among the brain regions that have been studied. The
regions rich in cholinergic neurons such as the cortex, hippocampus, and
striatum showed more response after 21 days of carnitine treatment. The results
of the present study suggest the role of L-carnitine as a neuromodulator and
antiaging medication.

PMID: 14630876 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

how much al do you take?

whoops!
my neuologist prescribes iv glutathione for symptom reduction, neuro-protection of my pd. there is a published paper on this therapy, the experiment was conducted in italy. there is another study bbeing conducted in, i believe, miami fl, that should be published any time. i will try to find the italian study and then i,ll ask for help to post it here.

has anyone tried intermittant fasting?

Dr, Lieberman's theoretical basis, at:

http://www.parkinsonresearchfoundati...349&Itemid=104

http://www.parkinsonresearchfoundati...d=79&Itemid=95

http://www.parkinsonresearchfoundati...=219&Itemid=83

examples of active exercise:

Cycling: Inevergiveup.org, tandem bycicling, static byke.

Examples of passive exercise:
As mentioned by Dr. Lieberman: acceleration therapeutics, EECP,and found elsewhere, blood modulation therapy.

http://www.werththerapie.de/en/hintergruende.html

On these pages we inform you about an alternative treatment of Parkinson’s disease and the physiological background of peripheral stimulation of the brain.

http://www.werththerapie.de/en/player.html

Hello,
I'm new to this group, not sure if I'm doing this posting right, anyway here it goes.
"Brain Gym" I've been practicing it for about 4 years now. I don't do it every day, and it only takes about 15 minutes, but their's lots of different exercises so you can, so do as many as you like and do different ones each time.
When I lived in Calgary, I belonged to the young onset pd group. Once of the facilitators put together a course on "Brain Gym". She told us that pd'ers practicing this have shown improvements. I don't remember where she got the following info, but it really sounded interesting: "By practicing Brain Gym, you will stimulate new areas of the brain to create dopamine" Sounds good enough for me, so I signed up for the course.

So what is "Brain Gym"
Info taken from: brainworksnaturally.com
Brain Gym® consists of various combinations of 26 targeted movements. It grew out of clinical studies started in 1969 by Paul Dennison. In the more than thirty years since, research has shown that application of Brain Gym® provides significant improvement in concentration, memory, reading, organization skills, language and number skills, writing, speaking, athletic performance and more. It is used worldwide in more than 90 countries, in 40 different languages. In 1989, in response to "The Nation At Risk" study, The National Learning Foundation selected Brain Gym® as a recommended learning strategy, and continued to rate it highly throughout the 1990’s.

Who Benefits ?
Students with special needs, ADD, ADHD, autism, dyslexia, patients with Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease, and people with learning disorders have all shown improvement using brain gym. Change may be remarkably immediate or take place in a period of days or weeks, according to the extent of the problem, but profound differences are usually noticed by the clients themselves. Check into research studies for more information.
Anyone who wants to think better, clearer and faster can benefit. Academic, physical and personal goals are met using Brain Gym®. No matter what your age, it is never too late to activate! Learn simple ways to energize, meet challenges and optimize learning potential.

The best book I found on "Brain Gym" is called:
Brain Gym for Business by Gail & Paul Dennison
cost around $18.00 at Amazon.com
I couldn't find a book that specificallly for pd'ers

These exercises are fun and easy to do.
They are mostly cross-overs. Like an infant learning how to crawl, this is a cross over. You will be working both sides of the brain, creating new or strengthing the links between them.
These exercises will improve your balance, concentration, problem solving, handwriting, reading, speaking, memory, writing skills, focus, improves posture, releases stress, etc.

Here is an example of one of these exercises.
Called: "The Cross Crawl"
Taken from: Brain Gym for Business by Gail & Paul Dennison
You will need to be standing. Start by marching in place, alternate touching each hand to the opposite knee. Continue during the course of 4 to 8 complete, relaxed breaths. A variation of this movement can be done sitting down.
The Cross Crawl activates both brain hemispheres simultaneously. It engages the brain for coordinating visual, auditory, and kinesthetic abilities, thus improving such skills as lisitening, reading writing and memory.

I've had pd for 7 years now, and something I'm doing has dramatically slowed down the progression. As the months go by, I've been getting better, maybe "Brain Gym" has something to do with it. Who knows. It couldn't hurt. I'm also taking mucuna. Been taking it for over a year now with excellent results.

Sincerely.
Max

Hi Max,

Just ordered Munuca for for the first time because I heard so much about it, all good. Can you give me some information on how you started and how much you took, you know, the details.

I believe in taking natural drugs.
I believe in exercise. I set up my own regime that works great for me.

I too was getting better, until the Dystenesa set in and when I saw my doctor he said that I was being overdosed and reduced my Levocarb to half of what I was taking. 200 to 100 for 4 times a day.

But I'm still not happy and I want to get off as many drugs as I can, that's why the Mucuna.

thank you
C

Could you give me the dosages you are suing with the current formulas?

Have there been any results from extended fasts and any radical vegetarian diet