One common symptom of Parkinson’s is said to be apathy but sometimes when you meet fellow members of the “Parky” community that is difficult to believe. Take Kuhan Pushparatnam and Carl Beech, both of whom have refused to lie back and just accept what Parkinson’s throws at them. Each has come up with an innovation which could improve their own lives and those of many other Parkies.
CARL BEECH:THE BEECH BAND
It is just two years since Carl Beech was diagnosed with Parkinson’s at the age of 50, yet he has achieved so much for the community he risks making the rest of us feel inadequate. He is already chief executive of Spotlight YOPD, the charity lobbying for people with young onset Parkinson’s and now he’s come up with a quite remarkable gadget.
I was dubious when I heard that the device had something to do with cueing, the use of visual, auditory or physical signals to treat symptoms of Parkinson’s. I had seen a few examples of this working, like the Strolll visual cueing system I wrote about in July.
But I had also seen plenty of examples of gadgets, often devised by individual ‘Parkies”, which just didn’t appear to deliver what their inventors claimed. Then Carl Beech showed me his Beech Band in action with the demo you can see above and I was blown away,
For Carl, the most distressing thing about his Parkinson’s has been its impact on his voice, something he had begun to notice long before his diagnosis. For many years, as a church leader then through his work in development in Africa, public speaking has been a key part of Carl’s working life. But not only has his voice become a lot weaker, his speech has slowed down and become more and more disjointed. This, he says, is not just a practical problem, it leaves this usually positive character feeling seriously depressed.
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