Sleep Behavior Disorder study, conducted by researchers at Aarhus University, have discovered that patients with the REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD) lack dopamine and have a form of inflammation of the brain, which leads directly to an increased risk of developing Parkinson’s disease or dementia.
What is RBD Sleep Behavior Disorder?
Do you sleep restlessly and hit out and kick in your sleep? This could be a sign of a disorder associated with diseases of the brain. RBD Sleep Behavior Disorder is characterized by disturbances in the part of sleep where dreams take place. Healthy people are relaxed and lie still during dream sleep, while people suffering from RBD live out their dreams so that while sleeping they can hit out, kick and shout.
What Causes Parkinson’s Disease?
Parkinson’s Disease is caused by the death of dopamine-producing neurons in the brain. Symptoms are slow movements, often paired with shaking and muscular rigidity. Parkinson’s disease is more common in men than in women, between the ages of 50-70, and is a chronic condition that continues to worsen over time. The death of these dopamine producing cells is caused by a specific protein, alpha-synuclein, and this is the same protein that appears in the brains of those with RBD.
Researchers from Aarhus University studied a group of patients with RBD and analyzed their blood samples. They discovered that the inflammation in the brain and over production of alpha-synuclein is directly related to changes in the blood’s immune cells. This change in immune cells increased brain inflammation and decreased neurological activity. The study shows that patients suffering from RBD have a risk of developing Parkinson’s disease or dementia in the future, because they already suffer from a lack of dopamine in the brain. Parkinson’s disease occurs precisely because the group of nerve cells in the brain that produce dopamine stop working.
“These patients have an inflammation of the brain in the area where the dopamine-producing nerve cells are found,” says one of the researchers behind the study, Morten Gersel Stokholm from Aarhus University and the PET Center at Aarhus University Hospital.
This is completely new knowledge, as researchers have not previously demonstrated that there is a form of inflammation of the brain in patients who are at risk of developing Parkinson’s disease.
“With this study, we have gained new knowledge about the disease processes in the brain in the early initial stages of the disease development. The idea is for this knowledge to be used to determine which patients with the sleep disorder will later develop Parkinson’s disease. At the same time, this is also knowledge that can help to develop drugs which can stop or slow the development of the diseases,” explains Medical Doctor and PhD student Morten Gersel Stokholm.
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