Welcome back to another blog post by carer activist and Carers UK volunteer Matthew McKenzie. This blog post is focused on the upcoming event aimed at black communities to address Parkinsons.

The event will be hosted by Parkinsons UK who fight hard to raise awareness of parkinsons and promote better treatment and services for those affected by Parkinsons disease.

Parkinsons disease does not discriminate, although parkinsons usually affect those at an older age, it can affect others from any age, race or social standing. Parkinsons is a devasting illness and can easily put a strain on families and whole communities. This includes those from the black community

To increase awareness of how Parkinsons can affect the black community, we must come together to learn and discuss what steps we can taken to reduce the impact of the disease. It is not only the impact on the person diagnosed with Parkinsons, but also the family and carer trying to improve quality of life.

Taken from Parkinsons UK website. Parkinson’s is a progressive neurological condition. This means that it causes problems in the brain and gets worse over time.

People with Parkinson’s don’t have enough of the chemical dopamine in their brain because some of the nerve cells that make it have stopped working. Around 153,000 people live with Parkinson’s in the UK. And it’s the fastest growing neurological condition in the world.

The event Parkinsons UK is running is called “Addressing Parkinsons with black communities” This will take place online for both Wednesday 8th May and also Saturday 11th of May from 12pm – 4 pm.

I am proud to take part for the event on the 11th of May where I will cover how Parkinsons can affect carers and what steps carers can take to reduce the impact.

You can book online through the link below

https://www.parkinsons.org.uk/events/addressing-parkinsons-black-communities-uk

Please look out for my blog and video for “World Parkinson day” – which is on 11th of April.

Thanks for reading.