By assessing, evaluating and monitoring the effects that Parkinson’s has on a person’s mobility – including gait, posture, balance, transfers (e.g. getting in and out of bed or a chair) and dexterity – physiotherapy can help improve quality of life. Difficulties with simple daily activities can be eased, and some patients have even reported alleviation of Parkinson’s-related non-motor symptoms.
Here we have summarised some of the ways that physiotherapists can help people with Parkinson’s:
- teaching strategies to make many every-day activities and movements easier, including walking, sitting down, standing up, and turning over in bed
- helping maintain as much independence as possible
- working on stiff muscles and joints
- improving muscle strength
- coping with freezing
- preventing and managing falls
- relieving pain
- maintaining and improving effective breathing
- managing circulatory problems that can arise as a result of restricted mobility.
Early referral to a physiotherapist is recommended as this can enable the therapist to prevent some problems from worsening. However, all people with Parkinson’s, regardless of the stage of the condition, can benefit from physiotherapy to help them maintain as much functional ability and physical mobility as possible.
Physiotherapists will provide advice on how carers should support the person they are caring for, but it is also important that they help carers maintain their own health. For example, it is crucial that the carer understands and practices safe lifting and handling techniques to prevent injury to both the carer (especially their back, neck and shoulders) and the person they are caring for.
The sections on physiotherapy within this site describe how a physiotherapist might help someone with Parkinson’s in the early, middle and advanced stages of the condition. However it is important to note that each person with Parkinson’s is very different and the type of problems experienced, the rate at which they progress, and their severity varies greatly from person to person.
