Conference on PSP, CBD, and MSA (Australian conference, Nov 2009)

This is one of the best resources I’ve seen in a long time!  It’s terrific for PSP, very good for MSA, and good for CBD.  I offer a big thank-you to Bob Dunn, a member of the CBD-related Yahoo!Group.  He emailed me a link to these videos over the weekend.  I spent all Sunday watching them and taking notes.

Speakers at a November 2009 conference for allied health professionals (RNs, PTs, OTs, STs, social workers, etc) in Melbourne, Australia were recorded, and the videos were posted to YouTube.  The conference has a long title:  “The Challenge of Movement Disorders: Exploring diagnosis, management and best practice interventions in relation to PSP, MSA, and CBD.”  It was organized by Parkinson’s Victoria (parkinsonsvic.org.au) and PSP Australia (psp-australia.org.au).

One of the world’s top researchers of PSP and MSA, Dr. David Williams, who is based in Melbourne, is a presenter for over an hour.  He’s the co-author of a very important article on PSP and MSA, titled “Clinical outcomes.”  And he’s the primary author of all the major papers coming out about the various types of PSP.  Every PSP researcher I know of has adopted Dr. Williams‘s use of the terms “Richardson’s syndrome” and “PSP-parkinsonism.”

The multi-hour conference is broken into 10-minute segments.  For a link to all (but one) of the segments, see:
www.youtube.com/results?search_query=progressive+supranuclear+palsy+Westymedia&aq=f

The video includes each speaker’s slides, though in some cases they are hard to see.  (I noted that one of the segments is missing from that link.  It’s not a very important segment.)

My best guess as to the conference agenda is:
* Dr. David Williams, Neurologist – diagnosis and treatment of PSP, MSA, and CBD
* Dr. Fiona Fisher, Clinical Neuropsychologist – cognitive changes in PSP, MSA, and CBD
* Dr. James Howe, Consultant Neurologist – advanced care planning and end of life decisions
* Victor McConvey, Parkinson’s Specialist RN – management of PSP, MSA, and CBD in a collaborative fashion
* Jen Daddow, Carers Victoria – support for caregivers

Since the audience is healthcare professionals, a fair amount of medical terminology is used.  Those of you who have been reading medical journal articles, listening to the CurePSP webinars when they’ve had neurologists as guest speakers, or reading my emails for awhile will have no problem understanding all of the presentations.  Note that very little of the info presented is Australia-specific.  Some Australian terminology is used; for example, the word “carers” is used rather than “caregivers.”

I’m going to send out separate emails with links to each of the 10-minute segments and the notes I took, by speaker.  I’ve indicated which of the three disorders each segment pertains to, or whether it’s a general presentation on all three disorders.  The third speaker on advanced care planning didn’t have too much that was disorder-specific so I may send this out to our full support group (including the Lewy Body Dementia folks).

Robin