BrainBlog

Bohnen NI, Kuwabara H, Constantine GM, Mathis CA, & Moore RY. Grooved pegboard test as a biomarker of nigrostriatal denervation in Parkinson's disease. Neuroscience Letters. 2007 September 13; 424(3): 185-189. Department of Radiology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-0028, USA. Recent pharmacotherapy trials in Parkinson's disease (PD) using dopaminergic neuroimaging as outcome parameter failed to show significant relationships between imaging and clinical results. One possible explanation is that there is a non-linear relationship between striatal denervation and motor performance reflecting a statistical "floor" effect in the imaging data with advanced disease. Both the motor manifestations and the striatal dopamine denervation of idiopathic PD, however, are typically asymmetric and more meaningful associations may be found by comparing data from the least denervated striatum with motor performance in the corresponding body side. PD patients (n=28) ...