Melissa McConaghy - The New Parkinsons Treatment: Exercise is Medicine

Melissa McConaghy FACP holds a Master of Health Science in Neurological Physiotherapy and is one of seven Specialist Neurological Physiotherapists in Australia. She became the youngest Fellow of the Australian College of Physiotherapists in 2010. She is the past Chair and National Representative of the NSW Neurology Group for the Australian Physiotherapy Association.

Melissa is a passionate advocate for exercise and rehabilitation and is the Managing Director and founder of Advance Rehab Centre and PD Warrior, both based in Sydney.

Melissa developed PD Warrior, an Australian first, with her colleague, Lynn Tullock, over an exciting two-year period of researching, modelling, and testing the latest scientific evidence regarding neuroplasticity and exercise. Lynn is a neurological physiotherapist and Clinical Director of the Advance Rehab Centre. Since 2001, she has had a special interest in the field of neurological rehabilitation, particularly Parkinsons.

Disclaimer

The aim of this publication is to provide information of a general nature across a variety of general settings, situations, and circumstances. The information herein is intended only as a guide and does not provide specific advice or replace advice provided to you by your medical professional or other specialist in the area.

This book is written on the understanding that the author is not engaged in rendering medical services and that the book is not providing advice for specific situations. Specific medical advice should be sought by any suffering from Parkinsons before implementing anything in this book.

The author and the publishing services providor accept no responsibility or liability for the actions of any person who may use the information in this publication.

The intention of The New Parkinsons Treatment: Exercise is Medicine is to introduce you and other interested parties to a revolutionary new approach to the treatment of Parkinsons called PD Warrior.

Neurologists and other health professionals are referring to PD Warrior as a gamechanger and, since its launch in Sydney, Australia, in April 2012, it has grown exponentially, with extremely successful outcomes and widespread popularity.

The philosophy behind PD Warrior is that exercise, education, community, and a lifelong commitment to fighting the symptoms of Parkinsons cannot be underestimated. If you have Parkinsons and you are not doing PD Warrior, you are likely missing out. PD Warrior gives you an opportunity to fight the symptoms of your disease and to slow the progression down, to take control of the disease and your life.

The book is designed for:

People with Parkinsons who are curious about the potential of PD Warrior

People already doing PD Warrior who want to learn more about the theory underpinning the program

Family and friends of people with Parkinsons

Health professionals interested in learning how to deliver PD Warrior

The aim of PD Warrior is to help you develop a greater state of physical, mental, and social wellbeing. If you have recently been diagnosed with Parkinsons, you are not alone thirty-two people are diagnosed with Parkinsons every day in Australia and the number is rising by about four per cent each year. There is currently no cure, but it is rarely terminal. Parkinsons is simply a condition that you live with. How well you live with it is determined by whether you are at your best throughout the different stages of the condition.

Traditional approaches to managing Parkinsons have improved vastly over the last few decades. It was in the 1960s that Levodopa medication was first introduced, and it changed entirely the landscape of how Parkinsons is managed and treated. Since then, apart from neurosurgical techniques, such as pallidotomy and deep brain stimulation, there have been relatively few breakthroughs in therapy and management.

Until now

In the last few years, there has been a growing body of evidence showing that exercise may play a fundamental role in protecting the brain and stimulating the most efficient movement pathways possible. It is this capacity for the brain to reorganise itself and learn, called neuroplasticity, that lies at the heart of PD Warrior. PD Warrior is a sophisticated combination of intensive physical and mental exercises that harnesses the brains plasticity to help you to move better. It may also have an effect at the cellular level on disease progression. Exercise is medicine, and when prescribed correctly, it is an incredibly powerful tool.

The New Parkinsons Treatment: Exercise is Medicine is a must read if you have been newly diagnosed with Parkinsons or are in the early stages. PD Warrior has given people hope that there is indeed life quality of life after a diagnosis of Parkinsons. Parkinsons once robbed people of their independence, dignity, and enjoyment of life. Today, the situation is quite different and your approach to living with Parkinsons is pivotal to your wellbeing maintaining mobility and cognitive function are absolute priorities.

As a neurological physiotherapist, I have been treating people with Parkinsons since 2000 and have seen the very dark days some experience. It doesnt have to be that way. PD Warrior is not a cure and doesnt propose to be one. What it is, is very hard work, but often with amazing results. In all the years I have spent treating people with Parkinsons, I have never seen results from any other treatment equal those achieved with PD Warrior.

This book strives to answer the most common questions people ask about their diagnosis and how PD Warrior can make a difference. Examples of these questions, which will be discussed in greater depth further on, include:

1. What does a diagnosis of Parkinsons mean?

Being diagnosed with Parkinsons can be a terrifying experience, especially when combined with misinformation and a graphic imagination. Most of you probably merit a doctorate in Google searching by this stage! This book helps put this diagnosis in perspective and demonstrates that, from here on out, how someone responds to being diagnosed with this condition will determine more about its progression than many other things.

2. What options do I have for treatment?

Traditional therapy for Parkinsons has revolved largely around medication and compensatory movement strategies. For a select few, brain surgery has also been recommended. PD Warrior challenges the status quo and promotes exercise as medicine as an early intervention strategy. Used in combination with optimal medication dosing, PD Warrior has shown dramatically superior results versus traditional therapy and medication alone.

3. My symptoms are still really mild; do I really need to do PD Warrior?

Most often, even in the very mild stages of Parkinsons, people have already started to modify their life around their disease: subconsciously avoiding social activities, modifying the clothes they wear to avoid buttons and zippers, changing the food they order in restaurants subtle adaptations they may not even be aware of. Without treatment, they will continue to give up the things they enjoy. PD Warrior can help you to recognise these signs and, most important, learn how to fight the symptoms and get back into life. Think hard. What have you already given up?