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Effect of diabetes on some primitive reflexes
Author(s) -
Volpe G.,
Della Rocca G.,
Brescia Morra V.,
Belfiore G.,
Coppola G.,
Campanella G.,
Orefice G.
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
european journal of neurology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.881
H-Index - 124
eISSN - 1468-1331
pISSN - 1351-5101
DOI - 10.1046/j.1468-1331.2000.00080.x
Subject(s) - medicine , reflex , diabetes mellitus , neuroscience , physical medicine and rehabilitation , endocrinology , biology
Primitive reflexes (PRs) are present in newborns; they disappear as the brain matures and increase in frequency in healthy elderly individuals . Primitive reflexes are more frequent in some neurological disorders than in age‐matched controls. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of diabetes on some PRs. We examined three PRs (glabellar tap, snout and palmomental reflexes) in 376 subjects: 111 normal age‐matched controls, 60 patients with cerebrovascular disease (CVD) and 205 patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. The latter patients were divided into three groups: (1) diabetics without neurological complications (D); (2) diabetics with cerebrovascular disease (D‐CVD); and (3) diabetics with polyneuropathy (D‐PN). The frequency of PRs was increased in CVD, unchanged in D‐CVD (except palmomental) and greatly reduced in D and D‐PN. It is possible that the vascular lesions in perforating arteries of the pons in diabetic subjects, previously studied in some pathological reports, can account for the reduced occurrence of primitive reflex responses.