PD Tulip Petition: Symbol for PD Awareness

The PD Tulip pins were given out at the 2009 PAN Forum, 2008 APDA Young Onset conference, 2008 NPF Leadership conference, the 2008 NPF Young Onset conference, APDA Midwest 2009 conference, 2008 Tucson Power Over Parkinson conference, 2008 NWPF HOPE Conference, 2007 Phoenix Power Over Parkinson conference, and at other conferences. And affiliated and unaffiliated oganizations around the US are using the PD Tulip as well. We hope you will join us in using this symbol for Parkinson's Awareness in the US.

Sign our petition to show your support of the PDTulip as the US national symbol for Parkinson's awareness. Using the PDTulip transcends artificial boundaries created by the many Parkinson's organizations.

We encourage all orgs and volunteers to be proud of their organizational affiliation - use your orgs' symbol(s) with pride. But also use the PDTulip as a symbol that represents ALL people with Parkinson's and ALL organizations and ALL scientists in the US who are working for the cure. Please show your support of the PDTulip for Parkinson's awareness.

free graphics - click to download (or email jean (at) pdtulip.com for more graphics:

parkinson's awareness

order 1" pins directly from the Manufacturer:

Lasting Impressions
PO Box 1149
Issaquah, WA 98027
800-767-9577
li@pinsandpatches.com

100 @ $2.88ea / 200@ $2.34ea / 300 @ $1.79ea /
500 @ $1.46ea / 750 @ $1.37ea / 1,000 @ $1.29ea

or in small quantities from
Karen Painter or from
www.apdamidwest.org

New tulip designed by woman with Parkinson’s gaining grassroots support to become national symbol

By Sheryl Jedlinski

Co-founder pdplan4life.com

A new tulip is popping up in gardens across the country, just in time for Parkinson’s awareness month. The tulip — a red flower with distinctive leaves shaped like the letters “p” and “d” — was designed by a young onset person with Parkinson’s (PWP) from Washington state — Karen Painter. Grassroots support for making her tulip the national symbol for Parkinson’s awareness is growing.

“After staring at a pink breast cancer ribbon in a store window, it dawned on me that people with Parkinson's also need a nationally recognized symbol for awareness,” she recalls.

The red tulip has been associated with Parkinson’s awareness since 1980 when a Dutch horticulturalist who had PD developed a red and white tulip and named it "Dr. James Parkinson.” And the European Parkinson's Disease Association (EPDA) uses a stylized red tulip based on the "Dr James Parkinson" tulip as its logo.

When Jean Burns, co-founder of pdplan4life.com, saw the tulip her new friend Karen had doodled on a napkin, she was “immediately struck by the unique and beautiful design. Of all the tulips I have seen used for PD awareness, this one stands apart from the rest.”

Jean and Karen believe that Karen’s tulip design can do for Parkinson’s awareness what the pink ribbon has done for breast cancer. They hope that the established Parkinson's organizations will recognize this potential and use Karen’s tulip emblem in their materials alongside their official logos.

“We have a dream that Karen’s stylized tulip will become the symbol not for one Parkinson’s organization or event, but for the Parkinson’s community nationwide,” Jean says. “It will serve as a reminder that we all must work together to find a cure for the millions of people living with Parkinson’s disease.”

Jean and Karen’s campaign is not about financial gain or fame. They simply want to do something positive for others living with Parkinson’s.

To get the ball rolling, Jean  wrote a successful grant application which funded the creation of several thousand lapel pins based on Karen’s design. Jean followed this up with a grassroots letter-writing campaign to introduce the design to people with Parkinson’s and their local PD organizations. Karen sent her own "mission" letter to her friends and family and collected enough money to buy hundreds of buttons featuring her tulip logo.

At the same time Jean created a new page (www.pdtulip.com) on the pdplan4life web site enabling people to easily download the tulip graphic in a variety of sizes for use on their print materials and slide shows.

“We were able to get my PD tulip in front of thousands of PWP,” Karen says. “The groundswell of support for this design has far exceeded my expectations.”

“ I’m hearing from people all across the nation that they love the design, and they are requesting computer graphics of it to use on printed materials,” Jean says. “The dream Karen and I share is coming true.”

Parkinson disease knows no social, ethnic, economic or geographic boundaries. Some 60,000 new cases are diagnosed each year in the United States alone. While the condition usually develops after the age of 65, 15% of those diagnosed are under 50.

For more information, contact:
Karen@pdtulip.com
Jean@pdtulip.com