Robin Williams' Suicide Possible Linked to Parkinson's Disease
PAUL: The death of Robin Williams has gotten a lot of people talking about depression, hasn't it, and now Parkinson's disease. This beloved actor and comedian was open with his battles with depression, but the public had no idea Williams was one of the millions of American coping with Parkinson's. CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta takes a look at the links here.</s>DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Christi, I will tell you that there is a clear relationship between Parkinson's and depression. It's not so much that one causes the other. It's more that if you have Parkinson's and you've already had depression, it could make depression worse. Part of it is psychological. A guy like Robin Williams, for example, liked to exercise, liked to ride his bike. He did that in part to alleviate his symptoms of depression, and with the diagnosis of Parkinson's he might worry he wouldn't be able to do that longer term. But some of it is more than that. It's really what's happening in the brain. For example, people with Parkinson's disease, then tend to have less of something known as serotonin, which is a feel-good hormone in the brain. If you don't have as much of that, it could make the depression worse as well. If somebody had early stage Parkinson's, and keep in mind, most think about the tremor when they think about Parkinson's, but there are many other facets to it. People may have difficulty with balance. They may have difficulty with even blood pressure. They also can develop something known as a masked facies, having difficulty actually making expression with their face. And obviously that is something that would have been very important to him as well. He talked about his cocaine use in the '70s and '80s. We don't know that that had an impact and gave him more likelihood to have Parkinson's disease, but there are lots of studies on this specifically. We would have to wait and see another 10 to 15 years to see if there is, in fact, a relationship between early cocaine use and later onset Parkinson's. That link just hasn't been established, even though a lot of people talk about it. The good news for people with Parkinson's is that there are good treatments available. In fact, one of my favorite movies, "Awakenings," ironically, in some ways, Robin Williams played a doctor who found uses for the medication L-Dopa. That's a medication that can be used to treat Parkinson's disease. There's also things like deep brain stimulation, which has been used, and also early trials on stem cell transplants. So there are some potentially good options there. Christi, back to you.</s>PAUL: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you so much. And remember, you can watch "Sanjay Gupta M.D." later today at 4:30 eastern this and tomorrow morning at 7:30 eastern. We'll be right back.