Your condition & treatment
Coming into hospital
Patients - please bring all your medication in the original boxes with an up to date list of medication and timings.
You can also find more about the things you should bring and how to get here on our Patients and Visitor pages.
Drugs to avoid in Parkinson's
There are some medications that you should not take if you have Parkinson's. These include:
- Stemetil (prochlorperazine)
- Maxalon (metoclompramide)
- Haloperidol
- Chlorpromazine
- Promazine
This is not a complete list, if you are taking one of these drugs do not stop taking without consult your GP, Pharmacist or Parkinson's clinical nurse specialist.
If you are prescribed any new medication, please check it is safe to take with your medication for Parkinson's.
Driving
Many people with Parkinson's disease continue to drive. You must inform the DVLA and Insurance company of your diagnosis.
Factors affecting driving ability include: sudden onset of sleep due to the medications prescribed, alertness, reaction times, ability to multi-task, decision-making and eyesight.
What is Parkinson’s disease?
- Parkinson’s disease is a progressive neurological condition.
- Parkinson’s disease affects one person in every 500; there are approximately 127,000 people in the UK with Parkinson’s.
- Most people are over 50 but 1 in 20 are under 40 years old.
- People with Parkinson’s disease have lost approx 80% of their dopamine, a chemical messenger in specialised nerve cells in the brain.
- Without dopamine people find their movements become slower and take longer to do things.
- The loss of nerve cells causes Parkinson’s disease symptoms.
- Main symptoms are tremor, rigidity and slowness of movement and loss of balance.
- The symptoms can be controlled by drugs, therapies and sometimes surgery.
- Currently there is no cure but there is lots of research into new treatments and the possible causes of Parkinson's disease.
Parkinsonism
The main symptoms of Parkinson’s disease are also the main symptoms of a range of conditions that together are called “Parkinsonism”. Idiopathic Parkinson's disease is the most common form of Parkinsonism; other types include Vascular Parkinsonism, Dementia with Lewy bodies, Multi-system Atrophy (MSA), Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP), Cortico Basal Degeneration (CBD).
