A study of Parkinson´s Disease’s clinical biomarkers from epidemiological view

Abstract

Parkinson’s Disease (PD) is a movement-related neurodegenerative disorder. The overall prevalence of PD in the total population is around 0,1-0,3% and its etiology is hitherto unknown. Even if the disease has classically been defined as a pure motor movement disorder, non-motor symptoms (NMS), such as disautonomic, sensorial, emotional and sleeping disturbances, are also frequent in the earliest stages of the disease. Due to their early presentation, these NMS may serve as useful clinical biomarkers. Genetic forms are responsible of 15% of PD cases. Missense mutations in LRRK2 were first identified as a cause of PD in 2004 and nowadays are known to be the main factor in contributing to the genetic development of PD. One of these mutations seemed to be especially frequent in population of Basque ascent. With the aim of assessing the disease prevalence in the area, an epidemiological study was conducted in 2009 within the communities of Azkoitia and Azpeitia. Not only was the prevalence studied but also the appearance of NMS as possible biomarkers of PD was analyzed. Based on this, we thought that it would be interesting to study the same population sample that was previously analyzed in 2009, 10 years after. The purpose was to determine the relevance of age, NMS and environmental factors on PD development. In the conducted research, out of the whole sample studied in 2009 (232), information about 173 individuals was found. According to the results, there was an increment of PD along with the increase of the sample’s average age. Besides, the REM sleep behaviour disorder appears to be the most significant clinical biomarker of PD as well as the most meaningful risk factor to develop PD in the near future. All these outcomes need to be treated with some caution due to the reduced size of the sample analyzed.