You can help develop a visual tool to discuss Parkinson’s

We are calling on people living with Parkinson’s, family members and caregivers and health care professionals who care for people with Parkinson’s, to tell us what you need.

We invite you to participate in Educate PD, an exciting new project designed to help improve the way health care providers communicate with patients and caregivers about Parkinson disease.

Parkinson disease (PD) is a complicated condition associated with many symptoms managed by many medical treatments. “In our experience, discussing various issues in PD in the clinic setting can be complicated, limited by the ability of the health care provider to explain these issues and the capacity of patients and their caregivers to understand what is being explained,” says Dr. Sean Udow, one of the Educate PD study investigators.

The researchers would like to know what issues relating to PD you need more help to understand or explain. In order to gather this input, the investigators Dr. Sean Udow and Connie Marras, in a joint project of the University Health Network (UHN) and Parkinson Canada, invite you to complete this anonymous survey. Your responses will provide them with the information they need to make a tool designed to improve communication between patients, caregivers and health care providers.

The tool will make use of illustrations to improve both the ability of health care practitioners to explain, and the ability of patients and caregivers to understand, complicated issues in PD.

Feel free to invite other caregivers, family members or other people living with Parkinson’s disease to participate in this survey by sending them this link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/educatepd.

The survey will take between 15 and 20 minutes to complete and your participation is voluntary. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and your time before May 12th!