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. 2022 Mar;129(3):295-300.
doi: 10.1007/s00702-022-02464-x. Epub 2022 Jan 24.

Serum neurofilament light chain and postural instability/gait difficulty (PIGD) subtypes of Parkinson's disease in the MARK-PD study

Monika Pötter-Nerger  1 , Janina Dutke  1 , Susanne Lezius  2 , Carsten Buhmann  1 , Robert Schulz  1 , Christian Gerloff  1 , Jens Kuhle  3 , Chi-Un Choe  4
Affiliations

Serum neurofilament light chain and postural instability/gait difficulty (PIGD) subtypes of Parkinson's disease in the MARK-PD study

Monika Pötter-Nerger et al. J Neural Transm (Vienna). 2022 Mar.

Abstract

The PIGD (postural instability / gait difficulty) subtype of Parkinson´s disease (PD) is associated with faster cognitive and motor decline. So far, there are no quantifiable biomarkers to aid clinical subtyping. Neurofilament light chain (NfL) is a highly specific marker of neuro-axonal damage and can be assessed in blood. Here, we investigated if serum NfL concentrations are associated with PIGD subtype and PIGD scores in PD patients at advanced disease stages. Furthermore, we evaluated if serum NfL is associated with motor and cognitive function assessed with MDS-UPDRS part III and Montreal cognitive assessment (MoCA). Serum NfL levels were analyzed with Single Molecule Assays (Simoa) in blood of 223 PD patients from the bioMARKers in Parkinson's Disease (MARK-PD) study. Serum NfL concentrations were higher in PIGD patients independent of age, sex and disease duration. In linear regression analysis, serum NfL levels were associated with MoCA, MDS-UPDRS III and PIGD scores in unadjusted models, but remained significant after adjustment only with PIGD scores. In conclusion, increased serum NfL levels were associated with PIGD subtype and PIGD scores in patients with advanced PD.

Keywords: Biomarker; Hoehn and Yahr; MDS-UPDRS; MoCA.

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Conflict of interest statement

JD, SL and TZ report no disclosures. MPN reports personal fees from Abbvie, Abbott and study fees from Boston Scientific, Licher, Abbott outside the submitted work. CB received a grant from the Georg & Jürgen Rickertsen Stiftung Hamburg, served on the scientific advisory boards for Bial and Zambon and received honoraria for lectures from Abbvie, Bial, GE Healthcare, Licher, Orion Pharma and UCB Pharma. CG reports personal fees from AMGEN, Boehringer Ingelheim, from Daiichi Sankyo, Abbott, Prediction Biosciences, Novartis and Bayer outside the submitted work. CUC reports personal fees from Pfizer and Zambon outside the submitted work.

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