Parkinson’s disease and light therapy.

The Bronowski Institute of Behavioural Neuroscience in Kynton, Victoria have been devoted to understanding the changes in the brain chemistry that cause Parkinson’s disease for more than 30 years. The latest news is they have spearheaded a new treatment approach for this and other neuropsychiatric disorders.

Dr Greg Willis who leads the research team, tells us that from a traditional perspective, the death of dopamine nerve cells has been the presumed cause for the slowing movement, rigidity and tremor of Parkinsons. However, more than 40 years of treatment failures and severe side effects indicate that there is much more to the problem than traditional dopamine replacement can offer.

When dopamine cells die, there is a host of degenerative events, including increased production of toxic substances. The Institutes earliest work examined how various drugs and hormones such as melatonin might retard the formation of these toxins.

In the initial tests we employed melatonin, a hormone produced by the pineal gland, to see if it would diminish the severity of neurotoxins that routinely produce Parkinsonian like symptoms. We were amazed to find that meletonin exacerbated experimental Parkinson’s disease.

Recovery from experimental Parkinson’s disease occurred when we employed other methods for decreasing or blocking melatonin activity in the brain. In fact, a drug designed to do exactly that resulted in a complete recovery of experimental Parkinson’s disease to a degree that has never been seen in 100 years of scientific research.

This drug is currently being considered for development for human use, however there are other methods, we have successfully used that are non-invasive to test the feasibility of our suggestion that reducing melatonin secretion may be beneficial to Parkinson’s sufferers.

Non-Invasive Treatment for Parkinson's Disease

The use of bright light therapy in depression has been a common practice for more than 20 years.

Light therapy treatment was made available to Parkinson’s sufferers since depression is a common problem in these patients. Bright light has the added feature of reducing melatonin secretion from the pineal gland, similar to that achieved with our new drug. Light was administered from a commercial light source just prior to retiring and the effects on depression, sleeplessness and the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease were assessed on a regular basis. We then adjusted medication accordingly.

Not only was a significant beneficial effect seen in most patients with Parkinsonian symptoms like the bradykinaesia and rigidity. We found the use of Light therapy is so effective that in some patients their medication can be reduced by 50% without the loss of therapeutic efficacy. This reduces the psychiatric side effects and involuntary movement caused by dopamine replacement.

We believe this represents a major advance in understanding and treating Parkinson’s disease as the involvement of the melatonin system seems to play a major role in its aetilogy and treatment.

Furthermore, since drug interactions pose a major problem for Parkinson’s suffers, light therapy provides a means by which many of the symptoms can be treated without complicating their drug treatment and many drug side effects can be avoided.

One limiting factor, however, is the use of anti-depressant and hypnotic drugs as they reduce the benefits obtained by light therapy

Benefits to Australians and to The Rest of the World:

There are many benefits that emerge from this work. Firstly, not only has Dr Willis’s team given new hope to sufferers of Parkinson’s disease but they have pioneered the use of a non-invasive treatment that can provide some relief from a debilitating disease. This provides a new quality of life for many and will cut the cost of health care to them and to the government.

Light therapy provides an additional, effective non-drug treatment for depression in the elderly: a problem that is growing in plague proportions in western culture. Finally, it has broken the chains of tradition in regard to our understanding how our brain works in disease. It provides a new and realistic hope that is evidence based and has emerged from dedicated scientific commitment.

Dr Willis's reasearch has been published recently in Chronobiology International, 24(3): 521–537, (2007)

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY FEATURES OF PARKINSON’S
DISEASE IMPROVE WITH STRATEGIC EXPOSURE TO BRIGHT
LIGHT: A CASE SERIES STUDY

If you would like to know more about the work at the Bronowski Insitute & Dr Willis you can contact the insitute on +61 3 54 271 494 http://www.bronowski.org

More related Information can be found here http://www.bronowski.org/publications.html