Hello there, and thanks for stopping by… My name is Ian, I am 55 years old, and I have early onset Parkinson’s Disease. I was formally diagnosed, allegedly, in 2011 when my neurologist said “if I were a betting man, I’d bet that you have Parkinson’s”, but an official diagnosis came from my GP when I asked her for a sick note in 2013. “What’s wrong with you?” she asked, as she skimmed through my notes on her computer, “ah yes, you’ve got Parkinson’s”. So… diagnosed 2011/2013, although that is of little consequence since I know now that the symptoms from which I had been suffering from since about 1995 were, in fact, Parkinson’s Disease. In 2015, my (different) neurologist referred me to the Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) team at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery (NHNN) in Queen Square, London, to assess my suitability for this operation. On the 19th of April 2016, I underwent surgery to have electrodes placed in my brain (bilateral deep brain stimulation of the sub-thalamic nucleus) and a neurostimulator in my chest. Two days later, my device was turned on for the first time.
This Blog diarises my condition following the installation of the DBS hardware, my recovery from the operation and the day to day problems, challenges, victories, etc. For completeness, at the risk of boring you to death, I have also documented my symptoms in the mid 1990’s, my initial diagnosis in 1997, the battle over the following 14 years to review this diagnosis, and other factors that I believe to have had a negative effect on my health during this time (mercury from dental amalgam fillings) and which may be responsible for triggering my Parkinson’s disease.
All posts are titled in reverse date order – i.e. yyyy-mm-dd – so that they appear with the latest post at the top of the list. If you only want to read from when I was admitted to hospital, then start with post 2016-04-17 and work your way upwards. If you want to start at the beginning, you want 1995 – In The Beginning. You can find these posts in THE ARCHIVES now!