Your Gut Health-Microbiome and Parkinson's Disease

Physicians have noticed that constipation is one of the most common symptoms of Parkinson's. Around 50% of patients with the condition were constipated and it often preceded the beginning of movement-related signs. The prior research into the disease has focused on the brain and concentrated on the loss of neurons that produce dopamine. This changed in 2003, when Heiko Braak at the University of Ulm in Germany, suggested Parkinson's may originate in the gut rather than the brain. 

His findings from post-mortems of Parkinson's patients, clumps of alpha-synuclein, appeared in both the brain and the nervous system, which controls the functioning of the gut. In the brain, alpha-synuclein is found mainly at the tips of neurons in specialized structures called presynaptic terminals. Braak also suggested the changes in patients developed in predictable stages that started in the gut and ended in the brain. The research reasoned this was caused by a pathogen that travels through the vagus nerve, which joins the spinal cord to the brain. 

Another idea is intestinal inflammation from gut microbes could cause Parkinson's. Evidence supporting this came from a large study at the School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, using two U.S. medical databases to investigate inflammatory bowel diseases and Parkinson's. 

This study showed the prevalence of Parkinson's was nearly 30% higher in individuals with inflammatory bowel diseases. The researchers found in people who received treatment to reduce inflammation, the incidence of neurodegenerative disease fell by nearly 80%. Not all of Parkinson's patients will have inflammatory bowel disorders. The findings from the investigations into the occurrence of the two conditions don't apply to everyone with neurodegenerative disease.

Again and again, it's becoming apparent our Gut is actually in control of all our moods and Brain Health. Depression is rampant and Dementias, ALS, and Alzheimer's rates are going up rapidly. These dis-eases are causing such a load on families, health care systems, and facilities that it should be the first area of treatment to be attempted. There's a reason why the ancient Egyptians kept the gut intact when embalming the Pharaohs for the afterlife and disposed of the brain. 

Your Gut Health is where your entire well-being resides and we specialize in Microbiome Health, keeping your gut motility constant and brewing of your own probiotics and ferments. Talk to one of the Herbalists to assist you with your Gut Health.