@ttyymmnn said in Good Morning, Oppo:
My dad, who has Parkinson's, is making the best of it.
My dad had Parkinson's plus my cousin and uncle have it I'd like to share some observations about managing it.
He needs to pay attention to diet. Protein reduces Carbidopa effect. Here is a LINK .
My uncle tells me that exercise is critical, otherwise you get locked up. He has serious Parkinson's and walks miles a day. You can probably find research to back that up.
Carbidopa is a wonderful medicine that can when well dosaged can eliminate symptoms. But I have concluded that getting the dosage right really takes some attention. I saw that a lot of doctors just designate a dosage and never follow up to see how it is working. My dad was getting increasingly stiff and I talked with my cousin who was shocked at how little was prescribed compared to what he was taking. We asked the doctor permission to experiment with dosage and we got significant improvement.
There is long acting and fast acting carbidopa pills. What worked best for my dad was to take a long acting pill in the morning to base load his day and also a fast acting first thing in the morning to get his system up and going. Then as I recall he also took a fast acting later in the day. You really need a doctor that will allow you to experiment with dosage in order to get greatest benefits.
Anyway, it takes a combination of diet, exercise and the right mix of Carbidopa to get good results. My conclusion is as long as you aren't making big dosage swings, you will not get into trouble with adjusting dosage. So for example if he takes one 500mg pill of fast acting in the morning and he feels he needs more, try two pills for total 1000 mg for a couple of days. This is not a one size fits all drug. Encourage him to figure out what works best for him.
Our health care system doesn't have the bandwidth to determine what the right mix is, so its really up to the patient and their family to figure it out themselves.