When visiting a medical provider, you may hear many unfamiliar terms—tremor, dyskinesias, ‘on time,’ or ‘off time.’ This can be overwhelming, especially if you have recently presented with Parkinson’s.”

Below are some common terms and their meanings, to help ensure you and your healthcare provider are speaking the same language!

Tremor: rhythmical shaky movements that occur in a part of the body.

• Often in PD it is in an arm or a leg, when the limb is resting
  • Meaning it may happen when you are seated and just watching TV for example
• This is a slow rhythmic movement of a part of your body
• Usually in PD the tremor is slow, around 3-4 Herz.

Dyskinesia: Dyskinesias are wiggly extra movements that typically occur as a side effect from medications such as levodopa

• They can be described more as wiggly, writhing and a dancing type motion
• Sometimes can cause an abnormal posture of a limb (this is a dystonia)
• Many people notice this at the same time as the PD medications are starting to take an affect
• Sometimes people confuse tremor and dyskinesia

“On time”: this means periods of time where you feel your medications are working well and your PD symptoms are well controlled.

“Off time”: this refers to periods of time during the day when your medications ARE NOT working – you may have tremors, stiffness or slowness.

• Can be predictable, like always with wearing off or occurring 4 hours (or some time) after they last took the medication
• Can also happen suddenly, when the medications should be helping (during on time)
  • These are “unpredictable or sudden off episodes”

“Motor fluctuations”: medical term for the fluctuation in symptom control you feel due to your medications kicking in or wearing off

• meaning that you have periods of the day when your symptoms are better controlled, and other times when they are not.

“Motor complications”: this term encompasses both the motor fluctuations listed above as well as dyskinesia

“Kick in”: this is the time it takes for your medications to start having a benefit

“Freezing”: – this is a term used to describe when your leg gets stuck or glued to the ground when you are starting to walk or when you are walking through a doorway or a tight space

• This is often called “freezing of gait”.