Parkinson's Disease

Parkinson's disease also called paralysis agitans, is a degenerative disease of the central nervous system, with the lesions mainly lying in the substantia nigra and corpus striatum. The disease usually occurs among middle-aged people. Its major symptoms are tremor, muscular spasm and reduced action.
 
Tremor: It is the main symptom of this disease. At the early stage, light tremor will appear only when the patient is nervous, and it will disappear when the patient is calmed down. Such condition may last over a long period of time, and it can be misdiagnosed or missed diagnosis. At the second stage, the tremor will appear even the patient is calm, but it will temporarily stop when the patient does something. At the late stage, the tremor will always be there. When there is emotional disturbance, the tremor is going to be more serious in general. The tremor stops completely during sleep or under anaesthesia.

Slow motion and reduced action: They are from the increase of muscular tonus and a series of motor disturbances in posture maintenance and balance reflex. At the late stage, the patient can not move at all.

The Selection of Stimulation: Chorea and tremor controlling area.

For patient who has the symptoms of slow motion and reduced action, scalp acupuncture should be applied at the motor areas on both sides; and for patients who has the impaired sensation, the sensory area should be added. Scalp acupuncture can relieve the symptoms of some patients of Parkinson's disease.