In some Parkinson's disease patients, symptoms slowly worsen over 20 years or more, but in others the pace is faster. Which course any individual's illness will take is hard to say. However, according to the American Academy of Neurology, some evidence suggests that patients who are diagnosed at an older age, and whose initial symptoms do not include tremor, will see their Parkinson's disease advance more rapidly.
On the other hand, someone who comes in chiefly complaining of a tremor on one side of the upper body may feel miserable about it, but the shakiness can be a positive sign, says Susan Imke, a gerontological nurse practitioner in Fort Worth, Texas. "That's a good prediction of typical Parkinson's disease that responds well to medicine for many years," she says.
Another potential clue to a patient's long-term outlook is how the illness unfolds in the first few years, because in any given individual, the disease tends to progress at the same rate over time. "Parkinson's that creeps along in the early stages doesn't tend to just start to gallop at some point," says Imke.
