Objective: We addressed association between 30 non-motor symptoms (NMS) (using the validated Parkinson’s disease (PD) NMS Scale (NMSS)), and DaTscan putamen uptake ratios as part of a large-scale multicentre naturalistic NMS study.

Background: NMS in PD are heterogeneous and have been proposed to have both dopaminergic and non-dopaminergic pathophysiology. Pre-synaptic striatal dopamine transporter (DaTscan) may thus provide a surrogate marker for some dopaminergic NMS.

Methods: Data was collected from the UK arm of the NMS International Longitudinal Study (NILS, UKCRN No 10084), 85 PD patients who had undergone a battery of motor and non-motor assessments as well as DaTscan (¹²³I FP-CIT, Ioflupane) imaging were analysed. Association between NMS and DaTscan uptake was calculated using Spearman’s rank correlation.

Results: PD patients (71.8% male, mean age 62.05±12.05 years, mean disease duration 3.28±3.43 years, age of PD onset 58.77±12.27 years) had a mean NMSS total score of 50.35±40.62 and a mean NMS Questionnaire total score of 7.44±6.51. NMS and DaTscan putamen uptake correlation was statistically significant for visual hallucinations, delusions, dribbling of saliva, and olfaction (table 1). NMS burden and DaT uptake had a “very weak” correlation (right putamen r=-0.191, p=0.080; left putamen r=-0.231, p=0.033).

Conclusions: Although a minority of 30 NMS and NMS burden do correlate with striatal DaT scan uptake, the association if very weak and largely not significant. This suggests that the dominant pathophysiology of NMS is predominantly non-dopaminergic.

References: Acknowledgement:

We are sincerely grateful to the UK NILS collaborators, the King’s College Hospital Nuclear Imaging Department, and the MDS NM-PD-SG for the support. 

« Back to 2017 International Congress

MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/non-motor-symptoms-in-parkinsons-disease-and-putamen-dopamine-transporter-uptake-datscan-uptake-a-survey-of-85-patients/