Parkinson’s Disease

Vikki Slade Excerpts

Wednesday 21st May 2025 Westminster Hall

[Vikki Slade (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart. I thank the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Paul Davies) for securing the debate. It is interesting that three of the five Back Benchers who have spoken in it are from Dorset. I do not know what that says about our population, but there we go.

[Edward Morello]

I will answer that with one of my favourite facts about Dorset: if we were a country, we would be the oldest in the world by population age. We are older than Japan.

[Vikki Slade]

My hon. Friend and constituency neighbour is correct. We have the Jurassic coast, but we are also the oldest county.

My daughter is currently undertaking a PhD in the causes of Parkinson’s, and I should also declare that I am a member of the all-party parliamentary group on Parkinson’s. Although life expectancy for those living with Parkinson’s is much improved, their quality of life is deeply impacted. They are incredibly vulnerable to falls and infections, limiting their ability to work. The recent changes to PIP are causing deep distress to the community. I look forward to hearing how the Government will recognise the needs of those with fluctuating neurological conditions in assessments.

However, I want to focus on the issues of treatment and care for patients. There are 216 people currently registered as living with Parkinson’s in my constituency. I have been told that there is virtually no service of specialist nurses or active phone line support in my community. That leaves vulnerable people isolated and at higher risk of traumatic, expensive and often unnecessary hospital admissions.

The Minister will be aware that an absolute diagnosis of Parkinson’s is possible only post-mortem—I pay tribute to the work of the brain bank at Imperial and that of the similar motor neurone disease brain bank at King’s College London. We therefore rely on specialists to focus on the symptoms in order to make a diagnosis, but there is a significant problem, which was explained to me this week by a GP at Walford Mill surgery in Wimborne when I spent the morning shadowing him. He told me that wait times for diagnosis for Parkinson’s can be more than six months, so experienced GPs who are able to prescribe medications have a dilemma. They can help their patients by prescribing medications to reduce the symptoms, but in doing so they make it more difficult for the specialists to diagnose the condition. If the referral-to-treatment times were dramatically improved, GPs could ask people to wait, but with the current delays, it seems cruel to ask both those living with symptoms and their family doctor to do that.

That takes me to my next point: the lack of neurologists. The UK is 44th out of 45 countries in Europe for number of neurologists per head of population, and the waiting list for neurological conditions stands at a staggering 232,994 people. According to Alzheimer’s Research, neurological conditions are the leading cause of global ill health, with 3.4 billion people suffering from one, which makes it seem even crazier that we have this problem. It is not only that: Parkinson’s, along with other neuro conditions such as functional neurological disorder and achalasia, which I have raised previously, require multidisciplinary teams to look after patients, and local NHS systems just are not set up to do that properly. Will the Minister ensure that the NHS 10-year plan will deliver ways of working that will support those with such conditions?

Finally, I will touch on prescription charges. I know the issue has been raised before, but the list of conditions for free medication has not changed since 1968. It is shocking that Parkinson’s is not one of those conditions. My constituent, Carole, who was diagnosed aged just 46, is finding that really tough and believes, as I do, that a full review of these conditions for working-age people should be undertaken now.

The final word must go to two of my constituents. Malcolm, from Wimborne, said:

“I have suffered from Parkinson’s for 10 years. It has changed my life completely for the worse. I cannot speak, I have frequent falls, we need better support.”

Danielle, also from Wimborne, who was diagnosed at 38, said:

“This is becoming more common with younger people…The impact of this disease on my life is immeasurable. It is more than a struggle. It is a fight every day. We need these issues addressed urgently to reduce the burden.”

I hope that the Minister will be able to offer us some comfort.