Figure 1.

Playing golf may lessen the risk of falls in older adults with Parkinson’s disease (PD). The goal of this narrative review is to highlight the potential role of golf to reduce falls in older adults with PD. The flow of this paper follows the schematic above by describing Parkinson’s disease, a chronic neurodegenerative disease. Over time, PD develops due to the loss of dopamine-producing neurons in the brain (the chemical structure of dopamine is shown above), which greatly diminishes balance, posture and mobility. Older adults with PD have a substantially increased risk for falls compared to age-matched adults without PD. Our literature review found that golf could be an ideal form of exercise for lowering the risk of falls in older adults in general, but especially for those living with PD. The quote is attributed to Aelius Galenus (Anglicized to Galen). He was a prominent Greek physician-philosopher in the ancient Roman Empire who studied many aspects of medicine including anatomy and neurology [29].