COMPLICATIONS OF PARKINSONS DISEASE

Complications:

Parkinson’s disease is a result of the degeneration of dopamine in nerve cells in the Substantianigra of the brain. It, in turn, affects the functions of the brain leading to various complications like slow movement and loss of balance. Tremors and rigid muscles are also some of the noticeable symptoms with the patients. Other complications involved in this could be –

• Difficulty in swallowing: Patient may not be able to chew food in a normal way because of which the saliva gets collected in the mouth and drools all over.This is when the condition is slowly worsening.
• Depression: Parkinson’s is such that after a period of time it you will have no choice but becoming dependent for the simplest of the activities. They also experience fear and anxiety killing their confidence.These emotional changes and dependency drives a patient into depression. Receiving treatment for them will help resolve other complications as well.
• Dementia: The patient also suffers from dementia unable to act or react on a situation immediately. The medication is unresponsive for such cognitive problem and hence cannot help the patient with this complication in any way.
• Bladder: The patient is unable to urinate or control its flow or able to sense the urgency. The bladder becomes weak gradually.
• Sleeping disorders: A patient with Parkinson’s generally undergoes sleep issues leading sleep disorders. He may be sleepless all through the night or sleep in the day. This lack of sleep sometimes leads to enacting their dreams in reality. Rapid eye movement and sleeplessness can be treated.
• Constipation: The Parkinson’s stiffens every muscle leading to several other issues. It doesn’t allow him to chew at a normal pace and also doesn’t digest what he consumes. The digestion becomes slow leading to constipation problems.

Apart from these, the patient will also experience the following complications.

• Recognition of smell: The nose being one of the sense organs fails to perform its function. The patient cannot identify any sort of smell or the differences between the smell.
• Orthostatic Hypotension: This is a condition where the patient undergoes dizziness or loss of balance due to sudden variations in his blood pressure. This phenomenon is termed as Orthostatic Hypotension.
• Decrease interest in sex: It is observed that patients slowly lose interest in sex or the performance itself weakens.
• Pain: They experience pain either in certain areas of the body or everywhere.
• Fatigue: The patient experiences steady weakness and disinterestedness in every aspect of life.

With the above complications surrounding Parkinson’s one loses self-confidence and dependency makes it all the more difficult leading to depression and lack of interest in life.Although the reason for the disease is unknown the symptoms are treatable and so are certain complications. Unfortunately the disease cannot be cured. There has been constant research to identify the Parkinson’s in its earlier stages.There are methods to heal the patient which is ofcourse rare and in certain cases only. The symptoms too vary from person toperson. He may eventually get bedridden and succumb to the disease.