Tell-tale signs of Parkinson's disease can be detected 20-30 years before symptoms appear, The Florey and Austin Health researchers have shown.
Footage courtesy The Florey
Footage courtesy The Florey
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00:00 So Parkinson's disease manifests itself as motor dysfunction, and we associate this disease
00:06 with the elderly.
00:07 This motor dysfunction is caused by a loss of specific neuronal cells within the brain,
00:13 and this neuronal loss occurs over a period of decades.
00:17 Our long-term goal is to identify people who are earlier, and with the prospect of opening
00:23 up treatment windows.
00:25 Our recent study published in Neurology offers us the opportunity to see that this is possible.
00:31 The study using PET imaging, positron emission tomography imaging, was able to demonstrate
00:36 that this neuronal loss occurs over a 33-year window, and that at time of diagnosis, this
00:42 is 20 years into the course of this disease, so the neuronal loss has been occurring for
00:47 quite a long time.
00:48 At the time of diagnosis, 85% of these neurons are already dead.
00:53 Now, this presents a major problem for us who are trying to identify new treatments.
00:58 I mean, it's very difficult to revive dead cells.
01:02 So ideally, we need to be able to identify people much earlier in the disease course
01:08 so that treatments can truly protect neurons.
01:12 So having identified that there is a 20-year window where this neuronal loss is occurring
01:16 on, this represents both an opportunity and a challenge.
01:19 The challenge is that, by and large, these people do not have any clinical symptoms.
01:24 But it's also an opportunity because if we can identify people, then we have holds out
01:28 the prospect that we can prevent the disease.
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