Alan Alda says he lives with Parkinson's disease: NPR

The actor Alan Alda, shown here in 2016, says he's been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

Evan Agostini / Evan Agostini / Invision / AP

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Evan Agostini / Evan Agostini / Invision / AP

The actor Alan Alda, shown here in 2016, says that he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

Evan Agostini / Evan Agostini / Invision / AP

Award-winning actor Alan Alda revealed that he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. "I'm not angry," he said. "It did not stop my life at all, I had a richer life than I had until now," Alda said while doing the same. announces Tuesday. on CBS this morning.

The actor, who had important roles in M ​​* A * S * H ​​and The West Wing, said that he wanted to inform people of the diagnosis that he received there three and a half years ago so that they know that there are things that they can do if they discover that they have the disease.

Alda also said that he had decided to talk about his neurodegenerative disorder to the public because, in recent television appearances, "I could see my thumb getting contract. just a matter of time before someone else makes a story about it from a sad point of view. He added, "It's not where I am."

Alda later posted a video of himself juggling, with the words: "If you get a diagnosis, keep moving! "He said that he took boxing clbades three times a week, played tennis and that he was walking towards Sousa's music.

He encouraged people who are diagnosed with Parkinson's should not be "immobilized by fear."

He asked for a test after noticing that he had a symptom of the disease that he had read in the New York Times – he was playing his dreams while he slept. Alda told CBS that he had thrown a pillow on his wife while he was dreaming of throwing a bag of potatoes at an attacker. The Times describes this as "one of the strongest pre-diagnosis symptoms" for Parkinson's disease.

When he was diagnosed, he said that he had no other symptoms. He said that "there is something I can do, I want to do it, before things start to manifest".

The actor also hosted Scientific American Frontiers on PBS for more than a decade.

Alda has continued to act since his diagnosis, and he's not alone in Hollywood. For example, actor Michael J. Fox was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1991 and continued to act, including playing a character with Parkinson's disease on The Michael J. Fox Show . He founded the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research, which has funded more than $ 800 million for the search for a cure.

According to the Parkinson Foundation, symptoms include tremors and balance problems. "The cause remains largely unknown," said the foundation, and "although there is no cure, the treatment options vary and include drugs and surgery."

Approximately 930 000 people in the United States should live with Parkinson's disease at a Parkinson Foundation study.