60 | www.Ups tatePhys i c i ansSC . com | www.Hea l thL i nksUps tate. com HEALTHL INKS IS PROUD TO PARTNER WITH THESE UPSTATE AREA NONPROFITS One of the things Laryn Weaver and the Greenville Area Parkinson Society want you to know is that the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease are not always obvious. They have been working hard to educate folks about the disease for a decade now. “Everyone just thinks it’s Parkinson’s if there's a tremor,” Weaver said. “If you don't have a tremor, then you don't think about Parkinson's. But 50% of people with Parkinson's will never get a tremor. They'll have other symptoms. They'll go through other treatments. They'll have surgeries, because people don't know that it's Parkinson's disease.” Some early symptoms can include loss of sense of smell, difficulty swallowing, changes in handwriting, a voice that’s difficult to hear, stiffness and changes in gait, Weaver explained, adding that lack of education contributes to the problems faced by people with Parkinson’s. “In the community, people will go five, 10, 15 years without a diagnosis because most people don’t understand the lesser known symptoms,” she said. The Greenville Area Parkinson Society has been working to change that by helping to educate people in the community. “This disease just passed Alzheimer's as the fastest growing neurological disorder, and we think it's extremely important that the community at large, not just the Parkinson's community, increase their awareness and understanding of it so that we can reach people sooner with treatment.” The organization was formed in the early 2000s as an informal social group, and, as attendance grew, it was formalized as a 501(c)3 nonprofit by Patrick Sullivan and W. Stanton Smith in 2012. In its first four years, it served several hundred members with a support group and an educational seminar and had one community partner. Over the past six years, the organization has expanded to include 11 programs, ranging from education and exercise to support and mentoring, and it now serves 4,700 people with a full-time staff of four and more than 300 community partners. Only about half the people GAPS serves have Parkinson’s disease. The other half are caregivers, spouses and adult children of people with Parkinson’s. “You can live with Parkinson's for 20 years, which means you have to learn to live with it, for sometimes a very long time,” said Weaver. “It impacts the family as much as the CELEBRATING 10 YEARS OF PARKINSON’S AWARENESS AND SUPPORT IN GREENVILLE By Christine Steele
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