Parkinson’s disease is a debilitating condition of movement disorder that is both chronic and progressive, only getting worse with time. It is a neuro degenerative disease characterized by low dopamine levels. This is caused by the degeneration of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra, part of the midbrain that helps govern reward and movement. The exact cause of this degeneration remains uncertain.
The low levels of dopamine lead to improper functioning of the nigrostriatal pathway, one of the major dopaminergic pathways in the brain connecting the substantia nigra with the dorsal striatum. The pathway is involved in modulation of the extrapyramidal system which exerts a measure of control over bodily movements.
People with Parkinson’s disease experience gradual loss of control over bodily movements affecting how they move, speak and write. Symptoms start from something as simple as slight tremors and may gradually develop into bad posture, stiffness, slow movement, difficulty walking, amnesia and dementia among many other enervating conditions which keep getting worse. Patients may have to struggle enormously to make basic movements and often experience moments of “freezing” where they cannot move at all. Early symptoms may go unnoticed.
In order to understand Parkinson’s disease, you need to accustom yourself with a few things
Dopamine
The unmitigated role of dopamine is still being explicated. What we know is that it functions as a neurotransmitter, meaning that it is released by nerve cells or neurons and received by other neurons completing the transmission of signals between the cells. Dopamine travels between cells in certain neural pathways in the brain called the dopaminergic pathways which are neuromodulatory in nature which is to say that they are ‘broadcast’ over a region rather than targeted at particular adjacent neurons. It also means that they affect the behavior of the receiving neurons for longer owing to their interaction with metabrotopic or G-protein neuroreceptors, transmitting signals that neither excite nor inhibit.
The dopaminergic pathways are found to be associated with cognitive processes of reward, motivation, pleasure, attention, motor activity and associative learning. Dopamine also helps govern functions of arousal and pain sensitivity. An issue with these functions could lead to an array of disorders including but definitely not limited to ADHD, schizophrenia and Parkinson’s disease.
Neurons
Neurons and glial cells are what the brain is primarily composed of. While glial cells provide structural and metabolic support, insulation, regulate the brain’s network and far outnumber neurons while also preserving their functioning, it is the neurons that perform the heavy tasks of the brain including speech, movement, learning, motivation, and arousal.
Neurons or nerve cells send, receive and process information through electrochemical signals over long distances in the body. Neurons can be said to form the functional unit of the central nervous system in animals. The most recent plausible research suggests there are about 86 billion neurons in the brain. Anything that hampers the functioning of neurons could potentially disable a person.
Finding the cure
Although the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease can be treated and alleviated to an extent, no cure has yet been found. Conventional treatments include administration of drug Levodopa and deep-brain stimulation.
Levodopa or L-DOPA can be synthesized in a lab and is able to cross the blood-brain barrier. It is converted into dopamine by an enzyme called aromatic L-amino acid decarboxylase or AADC, temporarily increasing dopamine concentrations to alleviate symptoms of Parkinson’s disease.
However, over time its effectiveness decreases. Moreover, the administration of L-DOPA diminishes the body’s ability to create it naturally resulting in more movement disorders, making the situation only worse.
In cases where drugs are not very effective, patients may undergo surgery to implant electrodes that stimulate the deep brain. While these treatments relieve the symptoms, they are ineffective in slowing down or stopping the progress of Parkinson’s disease and dopamine cells within the substantia nigra keep dying.
Scientists have been trying for years to grow dopamine-producing nerve cells using stem cells in the lab so they may be able to replace the lost neurons with new, healthy ones. Recently, scientists at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Victoria, Australia have achieved something extraordinary and given us new hope.
The neuroscientists have injected stem cells into the brain of a 64-year-old Victorian man over an 8-hour-long surgery. The man whose identity remains private suffers from Parkinson’s disease. It is hoped that the cells will develop into dopamine-producing neurons in his brain.
In this experimental, first-of-its-kind surgery, two 1.5cm holes were drawn in the skull of the patient through which millions of pluripotent stem cells were transplanted at 14 injection sites, 7 on each side of the brain. The surgery had shown great promise in preclinical trials and is expected to slow the progress of the disease in the patient, if not completely cure it.
The patient was discharged within 72 hours after a 24 hour later scan after the surgery that revealed no complications. The patient will be scanned at 6 and 12 months to see if the stem cells have transformed into dopaminergic neurons.
The risks of such an operation run high with high chances of paralysis, stroke or even death but the prospect of reversing the damage of Parkinson’s disease is splendid, if not game-changing! This hope is garnered by the efforts of neurologist Andrew Evans and neurosurgeon Girish Nair among others and will pave the way for the next step in neurological science.
The Victorian man was the first among a dozen patients chosen to undergo this revolutionary stem cell procedure at the Royal Melbourne Hospital.
The results of this treatment will be validated in two years. For more information on stem cell therapy and research, visit Neo Matrix Medical.
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