Dopamine-transporter imaging and visuo-motor testing in essential tremor, practical possibilities for detection of early stage Parkinson's disease.
BACKGROUND
Essential tremor (ET) is often an alternative diagnosis to Parkinson's disease (PD) and some ET patients may later develop PD. Unlike the former, PD patients have deficient visuo-motor coordination (VMC). Recently, we have attempted to exploit this difference in order to detect PD in ambiguous neurological cases.


OBJECTIVE
To assess the possibility of using VMC testing for screening ET patients prior to [123I]-FP-CIT SPECT imaging.


METHODS
Ten clinically diagnosed ET patients who showed deficient VMC were subjected to [123I-FP-CIT] SPECT imaging. We expected these patients to show subnormal striatal ligand uptake, as in PD.


RESULTS
We found decreased [123I]-FP-CIT uptake in 80% of the patients. A significant correlation between ligand uptake and VMC was observed.


CONCLUSIONS
Impaired VMC is a pertinent indication for further SPECT imaging in patients with ET, in order to establish a diagnosis of incipient PD.
Schwartz
Miguel
M
Department of Neurology, Bnai-Zion Medical Centre, Haifa, Israel.
Groshar
David
D
Inzelberg
Rivka
R
Hocherman
Shraga
S
D000368:Aged; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D050483:Dopamine Plasma Membrane Transport Proteins; D042241:Early Diagnosis; D020329:Essential Tremor / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D008297:Male; D008562:Membrane Glycoproteins / Q000378:metabolism*; D026901:Membrane Transport Proteins / Q000378:metabolism*; D008875:Middle Aged; D009419:Nerve Tissue Proteins / Q000378:metabolism*; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon; D014326:Tropanes
D050483:Dopamine Plasma Membrane Transport Proteins; D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D008562:Membrane Glycoproteins; D026901:Membrane Transport Proteins; D009419:Nerve Tissue Proteins; D014326:Tropanes; C087552:2-carbomethoxy-8-(3-fluoropropyl)-3-(4-iodophenyl)tropane