<prompt> Answer this question truthfullyWhat exactly is Parkinsons disease?  <response>: <reason> Symptoms of Parkinsons disease have been known and treated since ancient times. However, it was not formally recognized and its symptoms were not documented until 1817 in An Essay on the Shaking Palsy by the British physician James Parkinson. Parkinsons disease was then known as paralysis agitans, the term Parkinsons disease being coined later by Jean-Martin Charcot. The underlying biochemical changes in the brain were identified in the 1950s due largely to the work of Swedish scientist Arvid Carlsson, who later went on to win a Nobel Prize. L-dopa entered clinical practice in 1967, and the first study reporting improvements in patients with Parkinsons disease resulting from treatment with L-dopa was published in 1968. 