World Parkinson’s day - “Not just motor symptoms”

Back row (L-R): Pakeeran Siriratnam, Kelly Bertram (Head), James

Strathdee, Melissa Tang. Front row (L-R): Mia Wu, Sue Varley

Monday 11 April was World Parkinson’s Day. This day is held annually to shine a spotlight on the lived experience of people with Parkinson’s Disease and their families to raise public awareness globally and also push forward future research to prevent and cure the disease.

Movement disorders clinicians and researchers in the Department of Neuroscience, Central Clinical School and Department of Neurology, Alfred Health participated in the day by wearing purple in their clinic and performing the hand gesture used for assessing one of the signs in Parkinson’s Disease.

Parkinson’s disease is a progressive, degenerative neurological condition that affects a person’s control of their body movements and their mental functioning. In Australia, it affects an estimated 219,000 people (https://www.fightparkinsons.org.au/about-us/media-release/parkinsons-prevalence/). 

Fight Parkinson’s (formerly known as Parkinson’s Victoria) is a leading source of specialised health information, advice, and services. Through research, education, and support, they strive to improve the lives of people living with Parkinson’s or Atypical Parkinson’s (PSP, MSA and CBS). More information on the day and what the community what you to know about the disease can be found here:  https://www.fightparkinsons.org.au/world-parkinsons-day 

The Movement Disorders service at Alfred Health works in strong partnership with academic researchers within the Department of Neuroscience at Monash University. The service has trained neurologists as Movement Disorders clinician-researchers through a formal fellowship program since 2008.

Head of the Movement Disorders clinic and Secretary of the Movement Disorder Society of Australia, Dr Kelly Bertram, said, “our service at Alfred Health is actively engaged in clinical trials bringing new treatment options to people with neurodegenerative disease, and we lead the Victorian component of the Australian Parkinson’s Mission trial into medication repurposing. At the moment we are excited to be a site for a multicentre randomised controlled trial of sodium selenate as a disease-modifying treatment for Progressive Supranuclear Palsy, funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (AUD$2.5M).”

The Movement Disorders program has directly resulted in the formation of new Parkinson’s disease and Dystonia clinics servicing both Victoria and Tasmania states, increasing access to expert care for patients in vulnerable regions. Most recently a new clinic has opened at Sandringham Hospital Outpatients rooms. It has also trained three international neurologists who have since returned to their home country (Sri Lanka and Malaysia) to provide specialist medical care to their community.

See recent stories:

• http://ccsmonash.blogspot.com/2020/07/in-media-progressive-supranuclear-palsy.html
• http://ccsmonash.blogspot.com/2020/02/motion-machine-could-improve-parkinsons.html 
• http://ccsmonash.blogspot.com/2018/09/the-rubber-hand-illusion-and-deep-brain.html

Visit the Movement Disorders Research Group - https://www.monash.edu/medicine/ccs/neuroscience/research/movement-disorders