Objective: To evaluate the association between speech difficulties and neurodegeneration of the putaminal dopaminergic system in people with early-stage treated with symptomatic therapy and advanced-stage Parkinson’s Disease (PD).

Background: Speech difficulties are a common symptom of PD. We have previously demonstrated that people with early-stage drug-naive PD with speech difficulties have lower levels of DAT-SPECT in the putamen compared with people with PD without speech difficulties.

Method: We included 285 early-treated and 14 advanced PD patients from the Parkinson’s Progression Markers Initiative (PPMI) database in the analysis. We assessed the speech difficulties using the MDS Unified PD Rating Scale (MDS-UPDRS) Part-III (UPDRS-III), Item 3.1 (Speech) ≥ 1. The differences in [¹²³I]FP-CIT Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT) levels within putamen were investigated in both people with early-stage and advanced-stage PD groups with and without speech difficulties. The differences were tested using t-test.

Results: In the early-treated PD group, the prevalence of speech difficulties was 59.6% (170/285) and the patients with speech difficulties showed lower [¹²³I]FP-CIT uptake in the putamen compared to those without. In the advanced PD group, the prevalence of speech difficulties was 35.7% (5/14) and the patients with speech difficulties showed lower [¹²³I]FP-CIT uptake in the putamen compared to those without.

Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate that speech difficulties are associated with greater loss of putaminal dopaminergic terminals in people with early-stage treated with symptomatic therapy and advanced-stage PD.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/speech-difficulties-and-dopaminergic-neurodegeneration-in-parkinsons-disease/