Parkinson Disease: Recent Articles You May Have Missed

Striatal Changes in Parkinson Disease. Owens-Walton and colleagues examined whether resting state functional connectivity changes to the striatal nuclei in Parkinson disease (PD) were associated with measures of clinical function. Their findings suggest a significant association between increased atrophy of the caudate nucleus and decreased cognitive function as well as a correlation between more atrophy of the putamen and severity of motor symptoms. The study provides support for using caudate nucleus and putamen atrophy as neuroimaging biomeasures for PD.

Source: Owens-Walton C, Jakabek D, Li X, et al. Striatal changes in Parkinson disease: An investigation of morphology, functional connectivity and their relationship to clinical symptoms.  Psychiatry Res. 2018 Mar 7; Epub ahead of print.

Effects of Fatigue on Balance. Baer and colleagues examined the effects of fatigue to gauge its impact on balance in patients with Parkinson disease. They also looked at brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and its role on motor function. Their findings suggest that fatigue does not have a negative effect on balance. Moreover, patients with a BDNF Met allele were not found to have greater deterioration in motor function.

Source: Baer M, Klemetson B, Scott D, et al. Effects of Fatigue on Balance in Individuals With Parkinson Disease: Influence of Medication and Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor Genotype. J Neurol Phys Ther. 2018;42:61-71.

DBS Clinical Outcomes. Chen and colleagues compared clinical outcomes after deep brain stimulation of the globus pallidus internus and the subthalamic nucleus in patients with Parkinson disease. The patients were either awake or asleep during stimulation. Their findings indicate that there were no differences in clinical outcomes whether patients were awake or asleep.

Source: Chen T, Mirzadeh Z, Chapple KM, et al. Clinical outcomes following awake and asleep deep brain stimulation for Parkinson disease. J Neurosurg. March 16, 2018; Epub ahead of print.

Daytime Sleepiness. Yousaf and colleagues undertook a case-control study to determine whether dopaminergic deficit is associated with excessive daytime sleepiness. Their findings suggest that dopaminergic deficits in the caudate may be associated with excessive daytime sleepiness in patients with Parkinson disease. However, whether this indicates pathophysiological causality is unknown because there may be dopaminergic involvement at other targets as well as non-dopaminergic involvement.

Source: Yousaf T, Pagano G, Niccolini F, Politis M. Excessive daytime sleepiness may be associated with caudate denervation in Parkinson disease. J Neurol Sci. 2018;387:220-227.