My husband has been given orders from his doctor to no longer drive. He has decreased depth perception. D has been taking this news very gracefully.
I have noticed something which may be related to this and was wondering if any pwp or caregivers have noticed this as well?
D is always straining to reach something. Example: when putting a cup of coffee on the table, he stands a considerable distance away and stands on tip of toes. This, of course, unbalances him and he falls. It dawned on me that this might be a debt perception problem.
Anyone experience this? Any solutions (he does wear glasses).
Thanks ever so much. Parkie wide
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It could be depth perception, but it could also be something else. I have trouble working in confined space. I need more space than I used to to maneuver.
Does he also sometimes have double vision? For us at an age of needing bifocals or progressive lenses, my guess is depth perception uses the the coordination of both eyes. (It can no longer rely on focus.) Muscle control issues is a primary symptom of PD. Vision and muscle control are two (but not the only) abilities related to equilibrium. However, in any case, it seems there should be some physical therapy to prevent falling.
Thanks for your insight. Need to find a opthalmologist who specializes in pd.
D has been through physical therapy many times. I have been told that D can only remember simple commands and that physical therapy is no longer an option for him.
He also participated in Rock Steady but we could no longer attention because of stability and high risk of falls.
Your husband needs to see a neuro-ophthalmologist, this may be a central nervous system disorder and not a vision one. A neuro-ophthalmologist will help narrow the differential diagnosis.
25-30% of people diagnosed with PD receive a changed diagnosis. I suspect this will be the case.
What you describe is loss of proprioception, the body doesn't know where it is in realtion to the surroundings.
I’ve had double vision, having PD, and the eye doctor, confirmed that these were likely PD related symptoms. He has examined many PD patients, and could see change in my eyesight, consistent with having a PD diagnosis!
My husband had depth perception issues. It drove me crazy. He would follow too closely and would drive too far to the right so he crossed the fog line all the time. He stopped driving after he had an accident and I told him we would lose our insurance or the rates would go way up if he had another one. He wasn't happy but he agreed.
I am always asking hubby not to drive so close to the person in front, especially on the open roads. He insists he is far enough behind and is doing the 2 second rule, but he seems unable to estimate 2 seconds now. I feel unsafe and he gets grumpy if I ask him to pull back a bit. I also worry his reaction times might not be as fast as he used to be.
I have this problem too, it isn't a vision issue, it's a central nervous system disorder.
I use this rule to compensate, if you can see all of the rear tires on the car in front of you, than you have sufficient space. If you cannot see all of the tire you are too close. If your husband can't manage this, it's time to stop driving.
If you continue to feel unsafe, it's time for him to stop driving! These are difficult things to navigate in a relationship. Do you have other family members (children) you can recruit to help reinforce your need to be safe?
Advancing dementia is top of mind when I read posts like this. It warrants a visit to your neurologist and frank discussion.
I must correct SE, that is dangerous advice. My state trooper friend says, first, if, he say IF, your vision, depth perception, proprioception and response time are ALL good as VERIFIED by a recent vision and driving test, then you need a 4 second, 4 SECONDS, of space. Otherwise, at 60 mph, you are virtually certain to hit a vehicle in front of you if it should stop short for any reason (vehicle ahead slows, weather, rerrain, squirrel, etc.}.
He says you are driving a weapon, and can kill a kid that suddenly jumps out or bikes into your way. And that you can't tell whether the driver ahead is engaged, reading a book, toking a marijuana joint, or taking a nap (I said I hope you're joking on that last, and he didn't laugh). .
He also says trucks tend to spit rocks back at your wind shield, and they are equpped with air brakes, which are many times more powerful than disc brakes and are factory set by their design at "always on" only they are held back by pressurized springs, and if you are too close you will definitely crash and maybe even be decapitated, unless you have a modern automatic braking radar control engaged.
I need to clarify myself, I wasn't talking about highway speeds!
Waiting at traffic lights I was close to rear ending the car in front of me. I aslo pulled put in front of my neighbor and didn't know it. He told me later what I had done. Now I don't pull out unless there are no oncoming cars because it's hard to judge how fast they are approaching.
I leave a very large gap between myself and the car in front of me and the tires are a good indicator that you are too close not that you are far enough away!
Nonetheless, if the passenger doesn't feel safe with the driver than the driver needs to defer to the passenger.
For the last couple of years I’ve been doing the driving whenever we go out, initially “volunteering” to drive for him, & he was OK with that, but then he started talking about getting a new car for himself, so I suggested he wait until he got his driving evaluated. Our county hospital offers driver evaluations by occupational therapists specializing in driving. They do a physical & mental evaluation before doing a road test with a specially adapted vehicle. My husband failed the first part so badly they didn’t even get in the car for a road test. He was very indignant, said the testing was unfairly difficult & not related to driving. I tried telling him he could hurt someone if he had an accident & that insurance would probably not cover any accident he was in. Didn’t make a difference, finally had to put my foot down & tell him I would never get in a car if he was behind the wheel, then had my son hide the car keys. Whatever it takes, if your husband isn’t a safe driver, get him off the road before he maims or kills someone. You might want to ask his neurologist to set up a similar evaluation for him.
He has been evaluated by a neuro psychiatrist for Alzheimers. D failed miserably on depth perception and was given orders by the doc to not drive. Didn’t think it would affect everyday activities?
This is all about me, I don't have PD, but my whole life i have had trouble figuring out distance because one eye is far sighted, and the other is near sighted. My brain learned to compensate and i figure out where I think something is. As you can imagine, I am terrible at playing sports.. I have always parked too far away from things and go too far to the right on the highway, but have never had an accident. Maybe just checking his vision would help, and he could get new glasses.
I guess he is using those compensatory muscles rather than muscles actually needed to use for a given movement ( in this case putting a cup of coffee on the table).
There are ways to retrain muscles and the brain. It’s called Neuroplasticity.
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