Karen Marie Blood
Department of Physical Therapy, Quinnipiac University, Hamden, CT 06518, USA
Justin Thomas Mierzwicki
Department of Physical Therapy, Lebanon Valley College, Annville, PA 17003, USA
Mariana Wingood
Department of Implementation Science, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC 27101, USA
Section of Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC 27101, USA
Sticht Center for Healthy Aging and Alzheimer's Prevention, Internal Medicine, Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC 27101
Barbara Billek-Sawhney
Independence Health System–Rehabilitation Services, Butler Memorial Hospital, Butler, PA 16001, USA
Providing holistic physical and occupational therapy requires a generalist’s perspective, even within the confines of specialist practice. In all settings, physical and occupational therapists must practice at the top of their scope to evaluate the whole person to identify potential pathologies which may impact success in the receipt of services related to their referral. As the population worldwide advances in age, and more individuals are living with Parkinson’s disease, it is crucial for all healthcare professionals, including rehabilitation specialists, to be able to accurately assess for signs of neurodegenerative disease. By reporting a patient case, this perspective provides clinicians with contemporary information related to the differential diagnosis of a neurodegenerative disease and introduces how the Geriatric 5M model can serve as a framework to inform the examination and intervention of a patient with undiagnosed Parkinson’s Disease. Traditional criteria for the clinical diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease are compared to updated, contemporary diagnostic criteria along with supportive criteria. This case-based perspective article emphasizes the importance of examining the whole person, not just the referring diagnosis, the ethical need of physical and occupational therapists to maintain contemporary expertise in clinical practice, and to refer when appropriate. New diagnostic criteria for Parkinson’s disease are included to promote the immediate application of these concepts into clinical practice.
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Copyright © 2025 Karen Marie Blood, Justin Thomas Mierzwicki, Mariana Wingood, Barbara Billek-Sawhney
This is an open access article under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) License.
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