Welcome to Chasing Life.

You know, probably right up there with cancer, neurodegenerative diseases are probably at the top of the list of conditions people fear the most.

Talking about things like Alzheimer's disease and other dementias, ALS or Lugarig's disease, multiple sclerosis.

I think part of the reason they scare us is because they happen to the brain,

which many of us consider the seat of who we are, our essence.

And it's also worth considering that these diseases unfold in the brain.

But because the brain is a bit of a black box,

we have a hard time understanding

what exactly is going on in there to cause the progressive death of neurons. Now, here is something

that might surprise you. The fastest growing neurodegenerative disease in the world is Parkinson's

disease. We already have 11.8 million people in Parkinson. We're now growing as a

neurodegenerative disease faster than Alzheimer's disease that to grab everybody's attention.

That's Dr. Michael Oaken. He is a neurologist specializing in movement disorders. He co-founded and

co-directs the Norman Fixil Institute for

Neurological Diseases at the University of Florida in Gainesville. He's also an author. His most

recent book is The Parkinson's Plan. In it, he and his co-author, Dr. Ray Dorsey, they set out to

bust the many myths surrounding the condition and also to peer

below the surface of both the brain and the body to investigate what is happening and why.

It becomes obvious, just absolutely obvious, when you see the folks with disease, that this

isn't just a disease of dopamine, this isn't just a disease of dopamine.

It isn't just a disease of the brain. We see it in the gut, we see it in the skin, we see it in

multiple organs. And so it is super important that we ask the why. Why does it start? Why does it

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