Neuroprotection is a slippery construct anyway, it predicates that if you do X then in time Y will not develop. How is this a measurable thing, it is more akin to faith than science.

I woke today with a thought about this, triggered by Paula and Jaye's responses yesterday. There are no patient defined descriptives of the pre-diagnosis state, only anecdotes, which are almost always dismissed. Some of us came to forums like this to find out what was wrong with us originally, I was on the MGH fibro forum first, where I quickly learned that what I had was not fibro.

But there are hundreds of us now, connected and articulate, who possibly, through the treatments and diagnostic f/ups and the dysfunctional mess that PD can make of our lives, may remember and be able to tell what those early things were that set us on a course to find out what was wrong, why we did not feel 'right'. Not whether we fitted into that four cardinal signs paradigm, but what we were actually experiencing. What exactly made us go and see a doctor in the first place. With new patients, sadly, still joining our ranks all the time, it would make an interesting study. Personally I think looking at that would yield as many answers as anything. Goes back to what I always think, PwP themselves are an under-used resource in the search to find out more about this disease.