Diagnosis denotes identifying the characteristics of a disease or disorder through examining its symptoms.
Two major ways exist for diagnosing parkinson’s syndrome, namely by checking one’s medical history and by undergoing a neurological examination. Normal lab tests are unable to identify symptoms therefore; bran scans are sometimes used to spot symptoms of other disorders that may pose as those of parkinson’s syndrome.
Popular brain scan methods are Computed Tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). These methods help to exclude symptoms of other diseases in diagnosing parkinson’s syndrome. Examples of which are basal ganglia tumors, vascular pathology and hydrocephalus. Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging, a type of MRI has been known to efficiently distinguish between typical and atypical parkinsonism.
Atypical parkinson’s syndrome may include symptoms of other diseases along side those of parkinson’s. Atypical parkinson’s symptoms are classified based on the pattern of damage they produce in the nervous system. Some signs of atypical parkinsonism are dementia caused by Lewy bodies, multiple system atrophy, cortical- basal ganglionic degeneration or cortical-basal degeneration, drug-induced parkinsonism, vascular parkinsonism and progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP).
It must be noted that patients with atypical parkinson’s syndrome do not respond to treatment with levodopa. This is because such patients do not own those areas of the brain that hold dopamine receptors. Atypical parkinsonism has an unknown cause. Yet, unlike typical parkinsonism, it is not hereditary.
Another way of diagnosing is by administering levodopa to the patient. The resultant reaction of the motor cells to it would determine if the person suffers the disease.
Moreover, the existence of Lewy bodies in the midbrain can also determine the presence of parkinson’s syndrome. It is only via autopsy of the midbrain that these bodies can be discovered. Diagnosis becomes apparent as the disease progresses. Medical scientists recommend a frequent review of diagnosis.
Lewy bodies are an irregular collection of protein that grows within the nerve cells of a person suffering parkinson’s disease, alzheimer’s disease and other disorders. These could be seen under a microscope upon performing histology of the brain which is the microscopic examination of the cell and tissue anatomy in animals and plants. Lewy bodies are known to cause dementia especially in persons who are above 60 years and are of the masculine gender. Lewy bodies dementia could also be hereditary.
PET and SPECT radiotracers are employed in measuring the function of dopamine in basal ganglia. SPECT refers to Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography, a method of taking images of the brain using gamma rays. This nuclear medicine tomographic procedure produces information in three dimensional viewing (3D). The 3D information appears as cross-sectional slices through the patient’s body. However, they could be reformatted or manipulated as desired.
SPECT radiotracer is used by injecting a gamma-emitting radioisotope known as radionuclide into the blood stream.
On the other hand, SPECT imaging is performed using a gamma camera to obtain multiple 2-D images from multiple angels then applying via computer a tomographic reconstruction algorithm to produce 3 D.
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