Patients with Parkinson’s diseases are often looking for ongoing counseling, education and support.  A recent study on telephone healthcare utilization in Parkinson’s patients demonstrated that increased telephone utilization in PD is associated with anxiety, depression and sleep disturbances.  Surprisingly, increased telephone calls to providers were not associated with motor disability.  Anecdotal evidence had suggested that PD patients have higher phone utilization than other patients with similar medical conditions  with similar physical disabilities.  Non-demented PD patients from an outpatient setting were classified into two groups:  high call rate > 1.9 calls/100 days and low call rate < 1.9 calls/100 days.  Frequent callers had a mean rate of 2.42 calls/100 days vs. low rate of .56 calls/100 days.  No statistical differences between the two groups were noted for age, gender, ethnicity, age of onset or duration of disease.    Frequent callers had higher Beck Anxiety Inventory scores, lower quality of life scores on the PDQUALIF and higher prevalence of sleep disorders.  No statistical differences noted in motor disease as measured by the UPDRS.

The conclusions from this study are borne out in our practice, as noted by the high volume of calls our triage nurses receive from patients with  neurodegenerative disease, such as PD.  Kristine Twomey, RN serves as the coordinator for the APDA referral center, hosted by the Neuroscience Group of NE Wisconsin. THE APDA provides many options for patient education and support services for patients with PD and other movement disorders.  Dr. Lisa Kokontis and Ms. Twomey conduct a PD subspecialty clinic weekly.  For more information on PD, contact: