Sport is not only recommended to stay healthy. It is shown that When the disease makes an appearance also helps fight its symptoms already take it better. An example of this is that of Javier Pérez de Albéniz (Madrid, 1960). His life changed when Parkinson was diagnosed 10 years ago. This journalist who has exercised the profession in a considerable number of media (El País, El Mundo, TVE, RNE, Telemadrid, Soitu.es …), a great fan of actively practicing football and basketball, among other sports, had to reinvent himself. On the search path he found a great ally, the Unit of Movement Disorders of the Princess University Hospital, where Parkinson is treated among other neurological diseases. Both He 'stumbled' with table tennis. Both have changed his life.
The desire to do Javier's sports and the desire to investigate and undertake the doctor Lydia López Manzanares, responsible for this unit of the aforementioned Madrid Hospital, They quickly made a great team. Javier Pérez de Albéniz and Lydia López Manzanares have participated in the presentation 'Diseases: Parkinson's Parkinson and Table Tennis' within the II Congress as a positive sport that is held this Monday in the Circle of Fine Arts of Madrid.
Pérez de Albéniz has played football, basketball, sport confessed to students and boasts of Ramiro. When Parkinson was diagnosed with Badminton.
“I discovered table tennis by chance, for a poster in which I announced the start of a course. I approached, tried and loved it. Now I practice table tennis daily; I have returned the desire to live, ”says Javier.
Dr. López Manzanares acknowledges that she found a patient especially motivated with physical exercise and From the hospital he proposed to start a project with the ethical committee to carry out a serious study On the benefits of table tennis in patients with Parkinson's: “The Association of Table Tennis Veterans donated five tables and with that we started working.” The benefits are numerous, progress: “In this type of neurovegetative diseases physical exercise helps the disease progress more slowly.”
Javier clarifies that the benefit of this sport is based on intensity, an extreme that corroborates Lydia: “The intensity adapts to each case and the state in which the disease is found, that each patient practices it with the intensity adapted to their level, but that there is an effort and that makes him sweat a little ”.
“There is a program from the hospital, which will be presented in the Spanish Society of Neurology so that all this work is not in an anecdote. With these data we want to demonstrate that Table tennis improves the quality of life of our patients not only in terms of tremors or motor symptoms, also in the mood ”, Lydia López Manzanares stands out.
López Manzanares highlighted Javier, who already knows what it is to win a medal in a world championship in table tennis between patients with Parkinson's patients, as an example to follow. “In the hospital we encourage our patients to come in tracksuit, to do sports. Javier's example brings us a message of hope. But it is not a hope because yes. There are many medical and also new treatments in study And, without a doubt, table tennis, also helps. ”
“I can only say that I am better than a year ago. Table tennis has improved my quality of life and knowing that there are more treatments under study fills me with hope ”, Pérez de Albéniz concludes.
Ace sport in positive It is a social commitment project that encourages intrinsically associated values to sport such as respect, equity, inclusion, humility, discipline or diversity. Faced with the tension and noise that is currently sporty in recent times, this initiative recalls that beyond the goals, baskets and records, sport has great potential as a transforming element of society.
