What a name! "Supernuclear" Palsy. In my mind I see a flowing cape enblazened with SNP. Of course it is not really "super", it is "supra", meaning above. The disease affects the part of the brain above the nuclei (“supranuclear”), which are pea-sized structures in the part of the nervous system that controls eye movements. Palsy means weakness. The best info I found on it is contained in this succinct page here.
This disease is comparatively rare with 20,000 people in the United States suffering from it. There is no effective treatment yet. Now you know all I knew when I walked in the door of my client's home. He was sitting in a lift chair with a transfer belt on a table behind him. Without the belt, and his walker, he goes nowhere. Even with the belt he must be guided from behind.
As we prepared to get him up, I was looking at him sitting there and trying to access how heavy this man might be. He was a bear of a fellow, big and burly. As we progressed through the visit and the tasks at hand he had difficulty with many movements. At one point he was frozen in his moment saying: "OHNO OHNO OHNO" over and over again. "What can I do to help?" I asked. "Move my leg." It wasn't pretty but we got it done.
The disease was very much like Parkinson's in presentation. The eye movements were the main give-away that is was PSP.
Here in Paradise, we have alot of retirees, especially in the Village. With an older crowd comes age-related complications. In my ten years in this area, I have seen more rare disorders and diseases than I ever believed I would see in my entire career. We are a small population, but we are greyer than most.
Nothing much surprises me anymore.
But I can still be shocked.
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"The biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, it is the fear of being unwanted." Mother Teresa
