I hope that I will be forgiven for jumping up on the fence to crow every now and then, but I have preached on this for several years now with little more than a pat on the head. Or, at least, no one has been sending me money. <Full disclosure- Author reports receiving no funding from Big Pharma but that he can be bought at a reasonable price if they want him. No coffee mugs please however.>

But let's be serious a minute. My personal soapbox has, for several years now, been largely directed being aware of the importance of seemingly harmless infection (outside the brain) for PWP. Things that we once would have shrugged off can now put us in a wheel chair for life due to the triggering of neuroinfammation (inside the brain). This happens due to early life exposure to bacterial toxin (LPS) leading to post-puberty hypersensitivity to the toxin. The bottom line is that our response to further toxin exposure triggers an over reaction that floods our brain with immune system chemicals that make us weak, shaky, confused, etc. We are all familiar with this reaction. We feel "sick" and seek the safety of our bed. But with PD it doesn't stop there and leads to further damage. It sometimes can lead to the creation of a feedback circuit that begins to feed on itself. In electronics it produces the horrible sound that we know as "feedback". In medicine it is called "sepsis" and is the leading cause of death in intensive care units.

But those are the extremes. A more mundane encounter might be an abscessed tooth, a UTI, or gum disease. All make our lives unpleasant, but if you are a PWP it can do much more. A case in point played out on this very forum and was what sent me off and down this particular rabbit
hole. Ron Hutton came down with an abscessed tooth and quickly became unable to walk or even stand! Even after the tooth was dealt with it still required an additional two weeks to get back in operation.

I am convinced that the hyper- response of his immune system had been poisoning him and would have continued to do so had there not been dental care available. This is why we should look at the possibility of hidden infection anytime we experience a sudden and unexplained worsening of symptoms occurs. It is why we should take care of our teeth and have a plan if we are felled by a UTI when our doc is out of town. And it is why we should research immune modulation rather than suppression or amplicifation.

So, if anyone has a brother-in-law who is on the Nobel committee, put in a word for me. From Science Daily this morning:

Brain Inflammation Linked to More Severe Parkinson's Symptoms

Aug. 28, 2013 — Reversing inflammation in the fluid surrounding the brain's cortex may provide a solution to the complex riddle of Parkinson's, according to researchers who have found a link between pro-inflammatory biomarkers and the severity of symptoms such as fatigue, depression and anxiety in patients with the chronic disease.

Lena Brundin of Michigan State University's College of Human Medicine was part of a research team that measured inflammatory markers found in cerebrospinal fluid samples of Parkinson's patients and members of a control group.

"The degree of neuroinflammation was significantly associated with more severe depression, fatigue, and cognitive impairment even after controlling for factors such as age, gender and disease duration," said Brundin, an associate professor in the college and a researcher with the Van Andel Institute.

"By investigating associations between inflammatory markers and non-motor symptoms we hope to gain further insight into this area, which in turn could lead to new treatment options."

The results of the study were published in the journal Brain, Behavior, and Immunity.