PATIENTS WITH illnesses such as Parkinson's disease and stroke will not be able to access a range of new treatments in a timely fashion, a leading neurologist has warned.
Prof Tim Lynch, consultant neurologist at the Mater hospital's neurological institute in Dublin, which was officially opened by President Mary McAleese yesterday, said he was concerned that as a result of treatment delays, a greater number of people faced avoidable neurological disability.
"The problem is there are 19 consultant neurologists in the country, representing the worst ratio of specialists per head of population in Europe, and patients will not be able to access these therapies in time," he told The Irish Timesyesterday.
There is one consultant neurologist per 200,000 people in the Republic, compared with one specialist per 108,000 people in the UK.
Neurologists treat patients with a wide range of conditions, including epilepsy, stroke, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's disease.
Referring to the latest advances in Parkinson's disease at a conference to mark the opening of the Dublin Neurological Institute, Prof Stanley Fahn of the New York Neurological Institute at Columbia University said there had been significant advances in the medical and surgical management of the disease.
He said many of the recent advances had been in neuro-protection, including gene therapy, designed to keep the nerve cells that produce dopamine alive.
Dopamine is a key neurotransmitter in the brain; when levels of the chemical decrease, symptoms of Parkinson's disease, including tremor and a difficulty initiating movement, result.
"Some new drugs have been shown to produce benefit if taken early in the disease, such as monoamine oxidase enzyme B inhibitors," Prof Fahn said.
