Maggie's PD

     I chose for my last neuro note to watch the movie "Love and Other Drugs." It is about a man named Jamie Randall, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, who becomes a pharmaceutical salesman, and by chance, meets a woman named Maggie Murdoch and they fall in love. Maggie is played by Anne Hathaway, and she has early onset Parkinson's and she is only 26. The story follows their journey as a couple. I looked up more about early onset PD because I wanted to see how accurate the story is of Maggie in the first stage of PD. The movie depicts her taking several medications for managing her symptoms. She has a resting tremor at times, and in one scene, she is depicted as having an action tremor when her medication runs out. At one point, she talks about her journey to her diagnosis, stating essential tremor, brain tumor, Wilson's disease as all being avenues her doctors went down to explain what was happening to her. 

    In the source I chose to learn more, it states that  people with early onset PD have more severe symptoms with involuntary movement because of the use of L-dopa. In cases of early onset, they choose to wait to prescribe L-dopa for as long as possible. I also learned that PD constitutes as early onset when someone is diagnosed before the age of 60. 

    I learned more about Parkinson's disease and the process people can go through with the disease. I felt like it was interesting to watch a movie that tells a story of this disease through the scope of a pharmaceutical sales rep. I am not sure that the depiction of the main character Jamie's job is totally truthful, but it is an interesting take. I thought it was cool that they actually use the stages and describe the symptoms that go along with each stage, just in normal conversation. I enjoyed this movie, but there definitely is a lot of nudity and sex scenes, so it is definitely not a family movie. I thought the story was compelling and I would recommend it to someone wanting a believable and "not too sappy" romance movie. 

References:

APDA. (2020). Early onset parkinson's disease. https://www.apdaparkinson.org/what-is-                    parkinsons/early-onset-parkinsons-disease/   

Zwick, E. (Director).  (2010). Love and other drugs. [Film]. Fox 2000 Pictures.