Meeting with our Parkinson’s Nurses
Tuesday 24 July 2018
Last Tuesday, we had really useful meeting of Spelthorne Parkies in St. Michael’s church hall, Ashford. The Spelthorne/Elmbridge area now has 3 Parkinson’s Disease Nurses (PDN), based at St. Peter’s hospital, which will increase significantly the resources available to those of us who have Parkinson’s disease (PD).
Jason had arranged for one of the PDNs – Angela Clarke, to meet us so that we could learn first-hand what their responsibilities are and how they fitted in with the consultant and the GP.
In summary, the role of the PDN is to help patients cope more effectively with all of the practical, day-to-day issues of living with PD. This can include:
- helping to find the best time / frequency / dosage of our medication to get the most out of it
- providing referrals to other specialties, such as physiotherapists and speech therapists
- drawing on their vast experience of how others manage the practical (non-medical) issues of PD to find work arounds more quickly than we could on our own
Ideally, we should see the consultant and the PDN once a year. However, some of us had never seen a PDN because there had been none in place, whilst others had had their annual consultant’s appointment regularly postponed. Angela told us how to get in touch with her and encouraged us to see her or one of her colleagues “to get the ball rolling.” We all felt delighted that, at last, there was new, enthusiastic help available.
Meanwhile, Angela left us her first piece of advice and something which we could implement immediately – exercise, exercise, exercise!
Richard Tannahill
