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Positron emission tomography suggests that the rate of progression of idiopathic parkinsonism is slow
Author(s) -
Bhatt Mohit H.,
Snow Barry J.,
Martin W. R. Wayne,
Pate Brain D.,
Ruth Thomas J.,
Calne Donald B.
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
annals of neurology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.764
H-Index - 296
eISSN - 1531-8249
pISSN - 0364-5134
DOI - 10.1002/ana.410290617
Subject(s) - parkinsonism , positron emission tomography , dopaminergic , medicine , nuclear medicine , central nervous system disease , degenerative disease , emission computed tomography , nigrostriatal pathway , dopamine , disease , substantia nigra
Abstract We performed sequential positron emission tomography scans with 6‐[ 18 F]fluoro‐L‐dopa in 9 patients with idiopathic parkinsonism and 7 age‐matched normal control subjects to compare changes in the nigrostriatal dopaminergic pathway over time. The mean interval between the scans was 3.3 years for the group with idiopathic parkinsonism and 3.9 years for the control subjects. The scans were analyzed by calculating the ratio of striatal to background radioactivity. Both groups showed statistically significant reductions of striatal uptake over the interval. The rate of decrease was almost identical in each group ( p = 0.6). We infer that the usual rate of loss of integrity of the dopaminergic nigrostriatal pathway in patients with idiopathic parkinsonism is slow and the rate of change between the two groups was comparable.