There is currently no treatment that stops the progression of Parkinson’s disease, but newly discovered biomarkers may change that. Neuroscientists at the University of Florida used fMRI to measure brain activity in regions crucial for movement and balance.

“Our work, and other key discoveries in the field, will hopefully move the needle for evaluating disease-modifying therapies in the future,” David Vaillancourt, the study’s senior author and professor in the University of Florida’s department of applied physiology and kinesiology, told HCB News.

Clinical trials for Parkinson’s disease have traditionally investigated whether a treatment improves the patients’ symptoms, not whether it has any effect on the progression of the disease. Because of that, the treatments may become less effective at curbing symptoms as the neurodegeneration advances.
For the study, the researchers recruited healthy controls, patients with Parkinson’s disease and patients with two forms of atypical Parkinsonism (multiple systems atrophy (MSA) and progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP)). All of the groups underwent two fMRI exams spaced a year apart and took a test that measured their grip strength.

The control group experienced no changes after a year, but the patients with Parkinson’s had a reduction in activity in two brain regions called the putamen and the primary motor cortex. Other studies have found that there’s a decrease in activity in the primary motor cortex, but this is the first time it’s been shown to get worse over time.

Activity also decreased in the primary motor cortex of MSA patients as well as the supplementary motor area and the superior cerebellum. The PSP patients showed decline in all of those three areas and the putamen.

The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health’s Parkinson’s Disease Biomarkers Program and is published in the journal, Neurology.

Vaillancourt and his team are now planning on using these new biomarkers, along with one that was previously identified, to test if an experimental medication that improves Parkinson’s symptoms can also slow the progression of those brain changes.

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