title: Eyelid movements during blinking in patients with Parkinson's disease.
abstract: We examined eyelid movements during spontaneous, voluntary, and trigeminal reflex blinks in 16 patients with mild to moderate Parkinson's disease (PD) off medication and 14 controls. Voluntary and reflex blink amplitudes tended to be smaller than normal for PD patients, whereas eyelid kinematics (amplitude-maximum velocity relationship) for all three blink types were normal. Spontaneous blink rate was less than normal for 10 patients and abnormally high for 6 patients. A significant positive correlation between spontaneous blink amplitude and blink rate was found. These observations suggest that PD modifies the gain of a premotor blink circuit shared by spontaneous, voluntary, and reflex blinks.
authors: Institute of Clinical Neurophysiology, Division of Neurology, University Medical Center, Ljubljana, Slovenia. marko.korosec@kclj.si
authors: Marko
authors: M
authors: Korosec
authors: Ignac
authors: I
authors: Zidar
authors: Dik
authors: D
authors: Reits
authors: Craig
authors: C
authors: Evinger
authors: Frans
authors: F
authors: Vanderwerf