User:Eiftu/sandbox

Causes of Parkinson's disease

• this article is too technical. Overall, the content reads more like a publication than a wiki article. Note, we don't want to change the material in a bad way, i.e "dumb it down", but we want to be sure we're explaining certain things in more detail or finding better analogies to explain a concept. How can we make this article clearer? It could be as simple as starting with adding more details to the section on genetic contributions of PD (or even linking to an article that already exists on the subject. The point being that we can increase accessibility by making the article feel less technical and more readable.
• this article is much stronger in its genetic arguments for PD than for the non-genetic (environmental + environmental-genetic) causes. While this may have to do with the current research focus, it doesn't correlate well with the theory that only ~10% of PD is genetic. If you spend 80% of an article explaining 10% of the disease, it can become conflated easily, which adds to the "technical" flaw of this page.
• the works cited by the article are many, but most of them are over a decade old! It would be good to see what the current research is like in the space of causative factors for Parkinson's and add to the article that way. Of course, we must keep in mind that this article is already too technical; when we do decide to add something, we must keep the first two points in mind in order to still make the article accessible to everyone.

ENVIRONMENT EDITS

• There is a decent amount of recent research on the involvement of nutrition and PD. This research is trying to further understand the potential link between the microbiome and development of PD. A small section on this could be added to the environmental factors section, unless we feel this research is too inconclusive to discuss. I will look to see if there are any solid review articles for this area of research.
  • Most of the evidence is somewhat preliminary for nutritional factors, here is one of the more recent reviews that I found:
    • Seidl SE, Santiago JA, Bilyk H, Potashkin JA. The emerging role of nutrition in Parkinson’s disease. Front Aging Neurosci. 2014;6. doi:10.3389/fnagi.2014.00036. 
    • There are quite a few studies suggesting that high levels of dairy consumption are associated with increased PD risk, so there is likely a review article on this subtopic. The level of evidence for this is similar to what is known for pesticide exposure which is discussed on the main page.
  • Most recent review paper I could find on the relationship between gut microbiota and PD:
    • Parashar A, Udayabanu M. Gut microbiota: Implications in Parkinson’s disease. Parkinsonism & Related Disorders. 2017;38:1-7. doi:10.1016/j.parkreldis.2017.02.002.
• Exercise is considered one of the main protective factors. Is there a good review article on this?
  • This is the best review study I could find, although it is from 2008:
    • Goodwin VA, Richards SH, Taylor RS, Taylor AH, Campbell JL. The effectiveness of exercise interventions for people with Parkinson’s disease: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Mov Disord. 2008;23(5):631-640. doi:10.1002/mds.21922.

Here is the draft on exercise as a protective factor for the environmental section:

2.3 Exercise

Exercise is considered to be one of the main protective factors for neurodegenerative disorders including Parkinson disease. The types of exercise interventions that have been studied can be categorized into aerobic and goal-based¹. Aerobic exercise includes physical activity that increases the heart rate. Aerobic exercise is beneficial to the overall brain through mechanisms that promote neuroplasticity, or the rewiring of the brain circuity¹. Goal-based exercises are often developed with the guidance of a physical therapist to use movement to improve motor task performance and enhance motor learning¹. While exercise has been consistently shown to be beneficial, the optimal interventional is still being researched².  

1. Petzinger GM, Fisher BE, McEwen S, Beeler JA, Walsh JP, Jakowec MW. Exercise-enhanced neuroplasticity targeting motor and cognitive circuitry in Parkinson’s disease. The Lancet Neurology. 2013;12(7):716-726. doi:10.1016/S1474-4422(13)70123-6.

2. Goodwin VA, Richards SH, Taylor RS, Taylor AH, Campbell JL. The effectiveness of exercise interventions for people with Parkinson’s disease: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Mov Disord. 2008;23(5):631-640. doi:10.1002/mds.21922.

• Risk Factors & Prevention Review (Published 2016)
  • Ascherio A, Schwarzschild MA. The epidemiology of Parkinson’s disease: risk factors and prevention. The Lancet Neurology. 2016;15(12):1257-1272. doi:10.1016/S1474-4422(16)30230-7.   
• 1)   Reference #27 should probably be omitted because the article necessitates a login + password (which means account + money) to access, and most people reading Wikipedia won’t have access, and referencing only an abstract seems doubtful.
• 2)  MPTT – produced when making synthetic heroin, causes Parkinson’s disease Gupta, B.K. “Synthetic Heroin-Induced Parkinsonism” Jefferson Journal of Psychiatry. 2 July 2017.  
• 3)  Pesticide exposure – particularly in rural living where agriculture is the primary mode of subsistence, use of pesticides (organochlorine) and herbicides. This is an older study but most other ones with this cause date back to 1990’s so this is the most recent I could find. Dick, F D et al. “Environmental Risk Factors for Parkinson’s Disease and Parkinsonism: The Geoparkinson Study.” Occupational and Environmental Medicine 64.10 (2007): 666–672. PMC. Web. 3 July 2017.

Genetics Edits

Genetic factors introduction:

• First paragraph does a good job in broadly addressing the question of genetic causes in Parkinson's. Reference #3 can be omitted as it does not seem to lend any new information and is outdated (2002). References #1 and #2 are also older (2004 and 2009)

• Second paragraph adds specific information that is reiterated in the chart. Reference #2 is credited often, so a more recent article could be supplementary.

SNCA gene:

• Mentions Lewy bodies but does not explain their pathology in PD. Reference needed here.

• First sentence "the role of the SNCA gene is important"--wording could be changed.

• Last sentence does a good job in explaining the correlation and importance of the gene and its function, but is supported by a older (2011) review paper about advancements in PD genetics. Sentence could also be placed earlier in the paragraph.

• Again,the section also mostly relies on reference #2, so a supplementary source could be useful.

LRRK2 gene:

• Second sentence describing the origin of the word "dardarin" seems unneccesary and should probably be omitted. Reference #7 is used here (underutilized), since the next sentence uses reference #2 primarily

FOR THE GBA SECTION:

• citation 10 is underutilized ("many positive results," really?) and needs to be updated (2011)
• very strong paper for the last sentence! Underutilized...so I would like to add a risk #: "The study concluded that in patients with Parkinson’s disease, the OR for carrying a GBA mutation was 5·43 (95% CI 3·89–7·57), confirming that mutations in this gene are a common risk factor for Parkinson’s disease." (Sidransky & Lopez 2012)
• "Genetic alterations of GBA, α-synuclein (SNCA), and leucine-rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2) together constitute the most common known genetic risk-factors for sporadic PD." (Ran C, Brodin L, Forsgren L, et al. Strong association between glucocerebrosidase mutations and Parkinson’s disease in Sweden.)

I am leaving the chart as is.

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Eiftu will send out an email that says what edits work for replacement and what edits are corollary and ask you to decide on top 10 edits with articles (based on strength) We will divide the edits accordingly (based on who worked on them) and replace (write over) or update/add (write next to) the actual article!

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SNCA/LRRK2 (done) Exercise (done) GBA (done)