Bradykinesia

What Is Bradykinesia About ?

First symptoms

Bradykinesia and Parkinson‘s disease are they the same thing?

I must admit, I never knew what Bradikynesia was till the day I got my diagnosis. When you see people with trembling hands you suppose they have Parkinson’s disease. You feel sorry about them and thank God for your health. Living a life with this degenerative disease can be quite challenging. One day, my left side started to feel a little bit different than the rest of my body. Especially the left arm. I knew that everything was fine with my heart, so I didn’t worry too much. The fact that my left arm wasn’t behaving the same way as my right one didn’t trigger any question marks in my mind. A couple of years ago I had tendinitis in my left arm, so I was certain that it was reacting differently because of this old condition. The moment I had to concentrate hard to make my left arm obey to me and when I had to lift it with my right hand and put it on the table, I knew I had to see a doctor.

Denial

The diagnosis was a total surprise for me: Parkinson’s disease. It must be an error, I’m not trembling. Then I found out that there is a form of Parkinson’s when you do not tremble, but you are slow, very slow. It is called Bradykinesia.

I remember the first months I was very upset. I was taking my medication regularly but, one day, after about two months of treatment, I decided, to stop all medication, because I couldn’t accept anymore that I had Parkinson’s or Bradykinesia, or whatever they were calling it. For two weeks, I didn’t take any medication, and I told my friends that I was feeling great and that I didn’t have this disease called Bradykinesia. Nobody could convince me to go back to the treatment prescribed.

At the end of these two weeks, I started to feel bad, my legs ached and, generally, I wasn’t feeling well, and I realized the wrongness of my attitude. I was in denial. My mind lacked clarity.

At that time, I read that Parkinson’s and Bradykinesia, too, may come with depression. I was already treating an old depression, and everything that happened in the last months might have worsened it. I was working in a very stressful environment and my doctor considered that I needed to stop working for a couple of months. And I did it, and it helped a lot my Bradikynesia.

Bradykinesia and my quality of life.

The symptoms I had at that time influenced a little the quality of my life. I was slow. I remember watching my hand slowly reaching the faucet of the kitchen sink to turn it on or off. I had to concentrate and give orders to my brain to make my hand move faster.

Outside, I needed a friend’s arm to lean on when I walked. I thought that soon I would have to buy a cane. I could go alone, slowly, but I felt safer when someone was accompanying me. This happened almost 12 years ago when I was diagnosed. In the meantime, the treatment had its effect, and I am doing very well, now.

There are moments when I easily lose my equilibrum, but I have never fallen. Yet. And I hope it will never happen.

How do you get into a car or how do you get out easily? Bradykinesia will make both of your movements difficult. Oh, other difficulties, when you want to turn from one side to the other in bed.

Bradykinesia. What do we know about?

We know that Bradykinesia makes our movements slow. Your routine day will become more difficult and you won’t be able to finish everything you’ve proposed to do that day.

These are a couple of things you may experience:

• difficulty in crossing\ folding your arms and legs
• the blink of your eyes will be more rare
• when walking you won’t swing your arms
• rolling over in bad will become difficult as well as standing up
• when walking you may freeze
• difficulty to clap your hands or tap your fingers

Bradykinesia and its complications

We need to treat Bradykinesia because it interferes in our everyday lives, and ruins our quality of life. Untreated, Bradykinesia may create a lot of complications. People with Bradykinesia may encounter difficulty with buttoning their shirts or brushing their teeth, as well as using a knife to cut their food or even walking and standing up.

Bradykinesia and its definition

I am happy to share with you a short paragraph about Bradykinesia taken from Parkinsons News Today:

What is bradykinesia?

Bradykinesia is slowness or difficulty in body movement and is one of the early signs of Parkinson’s disease. It is reported by approximately 98 percent of patients.

A reduced ability to move is seldom constant, especially in the early stages of Parkinson’s disease.Periods of normal movement can be followed by poor quality of movement, making it increasingly challenging for patients to carry out normal activities. It can affect the whole body, just one side of the body, or only one limb. The unpredictability of its onset negatively impacts a patientâ€s quality of life.

Small or cramped handwriting(micrographia), movement hesitation, reduced arm swing while walking, and reduced blinking may be subtle signs of bradykinesia. Patients may sometimes experience reduced movement (hypokinesia) or a complete loss of movement or akinesia.

Slow movements are the definition of Bradykinesia, as stated by its two Greek roots (brady = low; kinesis = movement). Bradykinesia, hypokinesia, and akinesia are commonly used interchangeably, but their meanings vary.

The term bradykinesia describes slower movement, hypokinesia describes reduced movement size, and akinesia refers to difficulty initiating movement. Although these phenomena are commonly associated and can coexist, there isn’t sufficient evidence to support the value of differentiation in clinical practice at present.