A single-question screen for rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder: a multicenter validation study.
BACKGROUND
Idiopathic rapid eye movement (REM) sleep behavior disorder (RBD) is a parasomnia that is an important risk factor for Parkinson's disease (PD) and Lewy body dementia. Its prevalence is unknown. One barrier to determining prevalence is that current screening tools are too long for large-scale epidemiologic surveys. Therefore, we designed the REM Sleep Behavior Disorder Single-Question Screen (RBD1Q), a screening question for dream enactment with a simple yes/no response.


METHODS
Four hundred and eighty-four sleep-clinic-based participants (242 idiopathic RBD patients and 242 controls) completed the screen during a multicenter case-control study. All participants underwent a polysomnogram to define gold-standard diagnosis according to standard criteria.


RESULTS
We found a sensitivity of 93.8% and a specificity of 87.2%. Sensitivity and specificity were similar in healthy volunteers, compared to controls or patients with other sleep diagnoses.


CONCLUSIONS
A single-question screen for RBD may reliably detect disease, with psychometric properties favorably comparable to those reported for longer questionnaires.
Department of Neurology, McGill University, Montreal General Hospital, Montreal, Québec, Canada. ron.postuma@mcgill.ca
Ronald B
RB
Postuma
Isabelle
I
Arnulf
Birgit
B
Hogl
Alex
A
Iranzo
Tomoyuki
T
Miyamoto
Yves
Y
Dauvilliers
Wolfgang
W
Oertel
Yo-El
YE
Ju
Monica
M
Puligheddu
Poul
P
Jennum
Amelie
A
Pelletier
Christina
C
Wolfson
Smaranda
S
Leu-Semenescu
Birgit
B
Frauscher
Masayuki
M
Miyamoto
Valerie
V
Cochen De Cock
Marcus M
MM
Unger
Karin
K
Stiasny-Kolster
Maria Livia
ML
Fantini
Jacques Y
JY
Montplaisir
D000368:Aged; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008403:Mass Screening; D008875:Middle Aged; D017286:Polysomnography / Q000379:methods*; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D020187:REM Sleep Behavior Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity