Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2016 Oct 27;12(11):622-634.
doi: 10.1038/nrneurol.2016.152.

Advances in markers of prodromal Parkinson disease

Ronald B Postuma  1 , Daniela Berg  2   3
Affiliations
Review

Advances in markers of prodromal Parkinson disease

Ronald B Postuma et al. Nat Rev Neurol. .

Abstract

Efforts to develop neuroprotective therapy for Parkinson disease (PD) are focusing on the early stages of disease, which offer the best opportunity to intervene. Early PD can be divided into preclinical, prodromal and clinical stages; in this Review, we focus on the prodromal stage and markers that can be used to identify prodromal PD. We consider the necessary properties of a marker, before providing an overview of the proven and potential markers of prodromal PD, including clinical nonmotor markers, clinical motor markers, neuroimaging markers and tissue biomarkers. Markers for which the ability to predict conversion to PD is supported by the strongest evidence include olfactory loss, REM sleep behaviour disorder and constipation. Markers with the highest diagnostic strength include REM sleep behaviour disorder, dopaminergic imaging and subtle motor parkinsonism. The lead time - the period between the appearance of a marker and conversion to PD - is highly variable between markers, ranging from 5 years for impaired motor performance to >20 years for autonomic symptoms. The cost of screening for these markers also varies dramatically: some require just questionnaires, whereas others require sophisticated scanning techniques. Finally, we summarize how prodromal and risk markers can be combined to estimate the probability that an individual has prodromal PD, with a focus on the International Parkinson Disease and Movement Disorders Society (MDS) Prodromal Parkinson Criteria.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. PLoS One. 2014 Feb 26;9(2):e89741 - PubMed
    1. Sleep. 2014 Feb 01;37(2):369-72 - PubMed
    1. Mov Disord. 2016 Aug;31(8):1114-9 - PubMed
    1. Ann Neurol. 2011 May;69(5):803-10 - PubMed
    1. Neurology. 2012 Dec 11;79(24):2302-6 - PubMed

MeSH terms