Cycling for Freezing Gait in Parkinson's Disease | NEJM 

It is... I love riding my bike

When your city has Dutch level of bicycle infrastructure, even able people feel it.

Thank you for sharing that ❤

wow, that's quite the nuanced phenomenon

Comments like these are gold

My father in law is suffering from parkinson from past 8 years his movement is restricted... he has diabetes from past 20 years but in control and also Blood pressure from past 20 years in control and 2 years before he had a slip disc operation done...

@@nagarathna I dont think the cycling is a form of therapy. Parkinsons patient cant control their movements properly, but when they have another force controlling or aiding their movement for some reason they stop twitching and jittering. Here the force aiding the patients movement is the bike pedals. I'm a bit sketchy on the details and mind you im just a highschool student but i participate in events such as brain bee where i learned something similar to this. To understand the disease you should research it.

Like i said I dont exactly remember the facts, but notice how the nurse aiding the man while he was walking kept on putting her foot in front of him? She wasn't showing him how to walk or take a step, she was trying to get his brain to interpret her foot as an obstacle in an attempt to get the man to stop jittering and take a step. I think that parkinsons doesnt allow for regular movement but only allows reactional movement or something like that.

"You missed the point here. The point is not that biking will cure his Parkinson's. The point is that discrete acts (like taking the first step in walking) and continuous acts (like the cyclic nature of cycling) rely on different networks in the brain. Whereas discrete actions mostly involve the basal ganglia (the part that is disrupted in PD), more cyclical actions rely on the cerebellum, which is typically not really affected in PD." This is another comment from Robrecht van der Wel on another comment down below explaining that the "bike riding therapy" isnt really therapy but more showing that certain actions are processed in different parts of the brain. Parkinson's attacks the basal ganglia which processes "discrete" acts which is why when not in continous motion the patient is jittering. i assume discrete acts include anything from moving a hand to to getting up walking and even staying still. Meanwhile Continous motion is processed in another area of the brain usually unaffected by the parkinson's disease which is why the patient can ride a bike without much complication. Sadly that therapy wont help or provide a cure for parkinson's at least i dont think so.

Why ugly? We know that pedestrians suffer far more head injuries than people on bikes that don't wear helmets. Would you suggest pedestrians walk with helmets or not try to walk at all? Life is full of risk, not taking any risk would kill the human race in a very short space of time.

Nope, something about riding the bike gives us PD patients a freedom we don't normally feel

The simple answer is this. When both feet are together and you want to start walking, there are no sensory cues for what the next muscle movement needs to be. The brain just has to know the pattern and be able to convert that to a movement. Parkinson's affects the ability to initiate this movement. When peddling, the pedals themselves create pressure on the feet that gives an idea of how muscles should move next - part of this is thought to happen in the spinal cord, unaffected by Parkinson's disease. This is also why when he was forced to step over the clinician's foot (at 0:24), he could start walking much more easily (albeit when this was tried again at 0:29 he lost his balance).

Likely because the issue is that there is something in the brain that is over activated(neural transmitter or neuron issues). When more coordination and other parts of the brain are required and do not have these issues then it can all work out. Basically a different area of the brain(or less effected) is in play when riding. It may be that if there is a NT that is causing over excitation that when more of the body is in use it reduces the NT's local effect allowing for more control. One would think modern medicine would pretty much know what was going on by now but there is $$$ to be made and golf courses to be played on so...

we only see what they let us see. who knows what other miracles they are trying to keep hidden?

The Elderly and Infirm are basically super heroes anyway. ;)

+FireWaia in short it's because - despite what people say - helmets don't reduce risk by very much, if at all: so it's a statement about where the risk lies in cycling - which is with car drivers, and how safety can be improved - which is by more cyclists, and better infrastructure.

+FireWaia It's not to show off what a bunch of badasses we are. We don't wear helmets because cycling is just a safe, normal activity for us. Everybody learns it at a very young age, everybody does it (even our queen and king and prime minister), we have great infrastructure and all motorists are used to having cyclists around. Cycling s just a normal thing to do, not something you have to dress up for.

I live in sweden, it's the same here, but we get taught that however safe it is, a helmet saves lives when the accident actually happens.

The critical thing is the speed of the cars around them. In the Netherlands where cars and bicycles share road space the cars slow down to almost a walking pace as they pass them and always give way -so the chance of a bump is reduced. Cars drive at normal speed when there is a dedicated cycle lane.

Every A&E doctor will tell you that most people who are killed or get seriously hurt in car accidents (car, not bike!) die and suffer because of head injuries. Heads hitting windscreens, dashboards, side windows, other car occupant's heads etc etc. So basically a lot of death and injury could be prevented if people had to wear helmets inside cars. And yet they don't, why?

+Spencer Schumann Does he look like a 4 year old kid?

+scarystuff1970 During the first 50 seconds, i would say he walks like one yes.

+OneMoreSOB the lord works in mysterious and shaky ways

+OneMoreSOB good one

If you blame God for all the inexplicable 'bad' things happening, you could also thank him for the good. However, I think there's no such thing as an angry God diciding that you should have a nasty disease and someone else will meet with an accident.

+c1f3r866 Drug therapy itself worsens them... :/

+c1f3r866 Just the exercise of riding his bike will do him good, and hopefully make him a bit happier.

You missed the point here. The point is not that biking will cure his Parkinson's. The point is that discrete acts (like taking the first step in walking) and continuous acts (like the cyclic nature of cycling) rely on different networks in the brain. Whereas discrete actions mostly involve the basal ganglia (the part that is disrupted in PD), more cyclical actions rely on the cerebellum, which is typically not really affected in PD.

O dear. This man is trapped in a malfunctioning body. Imagine how it must feel to him to be able to move fluently for once! Even if it is just for a few moments or for a longer bike ride. Plus that it might help us understand better how this motor disease works.