Thursday, October 26, 2023

Groundbreaking study reveals most effective adjunctive drug for Parkinson's disease

In a recent study published in npj Parkinson's Disease, a group of researchers concisely compared the efficacy, tolerability and safety of various anti-Parkinson's drugs used with levodopa, utilizing a network meta-analysis (NMA) approach. Compared with a placebo, the NMA outcomes revealed significant improvement in daily off-time with all drugs except for pramipexole ER. Ropinirole transdermal patch had the highest ranking for improvement in daily off-time, followed by pramipexole, ropinirole ER and safinamide. Click here to learn more.

Getting to the root of Huntington's disease: a plant-based approach

Researchers studied a fragment of the Huntington’s disease (HD) protein in plants and found a new way to stop it from forming toxic clumps. A special plant protein that the team identified can prevent harmful buildup in plants as well as in some HD model systems, showing potential for this approach as a possible way to treat HD. Researchers from Cologne, Germany, investigated whether the resiliency of plants could be extended to dealing with stress caused by toxic clumps of the HD protein. The scientists looked at plants under the microscope to see where the huntingtin protein (visualized in green in photo) was found under normal and heat shock conditions. Click here to learn more.

Physiotherapeutic modalities and their efficacy for restless legs syndrome

A comprehensive literature search was recently conducted using various electronic databases, including Google Scholar and PubMed, to investigate the impact of different physiotherapeutic interventions on the severity of restless legs syndrome (RLS) symptoms. The study examined these interventions to understand the effectiveness, comparative results, probable mechanisms and clinical implications of a variety of physiotherapeutic therapies for RLS, such as reflexology, electrical stimulation, stretching exercises and workout plans. The analysis of these results offers an essential new understanding of the various approaches to treating symptoms of restless legs syndrome. Click here to learn more.

2023 HDSA Family Education Day online

Join us on Facebook Live on Saturday, November 11, at 9:00 am MT for the annual HDSA Rocky Mountain Huntington’s Disease Family Education Day, featuring presentations by the region's leading physicians and medical experts on Huntington's disease research and patient care: Emily Forbes, DO, MS & Rajeev Kumar, MD (research), Meghan Smith-Cunningham, LCSW (social work), Phyllis Foxworth (advocacy) and Christina Vaughan, MD (palliative care).

Recorded on October 21 in Englewood, CO, the 2023 Family Education Day was co-presented by the HDSA Centers of Excellence at the University of Colorado and Rocky Mountain Movement Disorders Centers and the Movement Disorders Foundation. The recording also will be available for viewing on November 11 at www.movementdisordersfoundation.org. The streamed broadcast is free, but registration is recommended. Click here to register for the streamed event. 

Two sisters’ genetic puzzle leads to potential breakthrough in our understanding of PD

In a discovery published in the journal Neuron, scientists have challenged a long-held belief about the origins of Parkinson’s disease (PD), shedding new light on the debilitating neurological condition. Their research suggests that the malfunctioning of synapses, the tiny gaps that allow neurons to communicate with each other, might be a trigger for Parkinson’s disease.

Traditionally, it's widely accepted that the death of dopaminergic neurons is the initial event in PD development. However, this new study challenges that belief, suggesting that the dysfunction in these neurons’ synapses could precede their degeneration. Click here to learn more.