Are Alternative Therapies for Parkinson's Disease Really Effective?

Parkinson's disease is estimated to affect up to 1.5 million Americans with the majority of those affected being over the age of 60. Since Parkinson's disease is both progressive and incurable, many patients and their families look to alternative therapies as either additions to physician-prescribed medications or as replacement treatments. Sadly, there are a number of such alternative therapy "practitioners" that seem to be more interested in selling a product that has little, if any, supporting evidence as to its beneficial effects. This article will review the brain pathology responsible for Parkinson's disease and then review some of the more popular, or the more widely-touted, alternative treatments related to this condition.

In humans, the maintenance of normal muscle tone and the ability to achieve coordinated, purposeful movements is dependent upon a delicate balance of two special types of chemicals produced within the brain. These chemicals, dopamine and acetylcholine, are known as neurotransmitters because they govern the rate at which messages are transferred between the individual nerve cells of the brain. The brain's supply of dopamine is produced in a relatively small, discrete area near its base known as the substantia nigra,or "dark substance" (see Figure 1). In Parkinson's disease the cells comprising the substantia nigra are known to at first produce smaller and smaller amounts of dopamine before dying and, being true nerve cells, never being replaced by new cells. This results in a relative "oversupply" of acetylcholine, which is felt to be responsible for the signs and symptom of Parkinson's disease.