It is important to help your doctor decide on the best treatment course for you by providing them with an accurate description of your daily medication response pattern and possible side effects. If you can, describe the specific pattern of symptoms this will help identify the options that are available.

When identifying wearing-off it is helpful to try to characterize your day-to-day, and even hour-to-hour, symptom pattern. Try to be realistic and understand the limitations of your current medications.

It is not always easy to identify which Parkinson’s disease symptoms of wearing-off you are experiencing. One way to acquire this information is to keep a diary of medication intake, duration of benefits and possible side effects (Click here for an example of how to keep your diary). This could be kept over a week or so, for example, just before your next doctor’s appointment.

The types of information that can be recorded in a diary include:

The times of day when you take your Parkinson’s medications

The times of day when you have good symptom control

Which symptoms re-emerge during the day and when

What symptoms you experience at night

Any complications you may experience, such as dyskinesia, and their relation to when you take your medication

It can also be useful to note the timing of meals and snacks and whether this affects your symptom control.
As part of your assessment of wearing-off, you may find it useful to rate each of your Parkinson’s disease symptoms. For example, identify which symptoms are the most troublesome and how they affect your daily life

TOP