Movement disorders & Parkinson's disease
Released 4 Nov 2025
Extrapyramidal & Parkinson’s disease examination (theory) with pearls & pitfalls
We’re thrilled to announce the first episode in our movement disorders & Parkinson’s disease series (also continuing our clinical method series), beginning with a discussion of how to perform an extrapyramidal examination, particularly in the context of suspected Parkinson’s disease, progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), multiple system atrophy (MSA), corticobasal degeneration (CBD; or corticobasal syndrome, CBS), dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) and normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH), as well as assessing treatment responses to levodopa and other Parkinsonian therapies to distinguish an excessively ‘on’ or dyskinetic state, from a ‘good on’ state, from an ‘off’ state including a frozen state. As always in Riisfeldt Neurology Education, we provide a clinical focus to help contextualise the information, peppered with tips and tricks to optimise your examination techniques, and hopefully providing a structure to your learning, along with helpful mnemonics in order to aid memorisation. This episode is appropriate for medical students, junior doctors, physician and neurology trainees, and general practitioners (family doctors) and emergency physicians and their respective trainees, and any other health professional assessing patients presenting with extrapyramidal symptoms and signs or with a pre-established diagnosis such as Parkinson’s disease.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3kKGamt1Xxh5lQxjj6S4Qe?si=Kln3GJofQm6ZHf6ZN_uj1w
Released 11 Nov 2025
Parkinson’s disease: Common ward management dilemmas
In this next episode in the movement disorders and Parkinson’s disease series, we begin with a brief overview of the mechanisms of action of the medications used to treat Parkinson’s disease, before focusing on five common and important ward dilemmas encountered in the management of patients with Parkinson’s disease: (1) the patient is unable to take their oral antiparkinsonian medications, (2) the patient is psychotic or delirious, (3) the patient has autonomic instability/dysregulation with orthostatic hypotension +/- supine nocturnal hypertension, (4) the patient is frozen/in an ‘off’ crisis, and (5) the much-feared Parkinson-hyperpyrexia syndrome. We discuss pragmatic ways to tackle each of these problems, coloured with analogies and detailed explanations to make the content understandable in a structured manner (and hopefully also memorable!). This episode is suitable for anyone caring for patients with Parkinson’s disease, although it should be especially useful for junior doctors covering the wards on evening/night and weekend shifts (and medical students also about to find themselves in this position)!
https://open.spotify.com/episode/6M5fIvVP9r01c8JnsCDqvK?si=dHo6tBFLTg2VQppMC_cBmw
Released 16 Dec 2025
Dopamine uptake scan (DAT SPECT; DaTscan) for Parkinson's disease/primary extrapyramidal syndromes
This instalment brings another journal club episode, this time in the Parkinson’s disease and movement disorders series, focussing on the diagnostic accuracy of dopamine uptake scans (DAT SPECT; DaTscan) for Parkinson’s disease and the other primary extrapyramidal disorders/Parkinson’s plus syndromes (progressive supranuclear palsy, PSP; multiple system atrophy, MSA; corticobasal degeneration, CBD), and distinguishing these from other neurodegenerative conditions which may manifest with Parkinsonian features, and from other non-neurodegenerative conditions such as essential tremor, dystonic tremor, drug-induced Parkinsonism and vascular Parkinsonism. The episode also provides an example of critically evaluating a journal article and determining how it should be applied in daily practice, an essential and transferable skill across all of clinical medicine. This is a more advanced episode, best suited for neurology trainees and neurologists, although other audience members should also find it valuable.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3eJzA6Q3BJH6Ew9LGZqgqG?si=GjamVD4pR2Krx804Ir0ZgA
Released 30 Dec 2025
SGLT2 inhibitors and reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease and dementia: Journal club
This episode continues our run of journal club episodes, this time looking at whether SGLT2 inhibitors used for type 2 diabetes mellitus have any associated reduction in dementia (such as Alzheimer’s disease and vascular dementia) and Parkinson’s disease, therefore falling into these respective series as well. The content of this episode is best suited for more senior audience members (neurologists and neurology trainees), although all audience members (including medical students) will derive benefit from the way it teaches how to dissect a journal article, demonstrating the process involved in this critical evaluation and ultimately teaching how to decide in what ways a journal article applies to your daily clinical practice.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/0fqSoTMC7izWLZtetKm3V4?si=kpIxpMWORwOS5DlgcmGEPw
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