A newly identified biomarker may help diagnose several types of Parkinson’s-related diseases, Swedish researchers have announced.
The biomarker is an enzyme known as DOPA decarboxylase. It was discovered by Professor Oskar Hansson of Lund University, Sweden, and colleagues.
In the journal Nature Aging, they state: “The diagnosis of Parkinsonian disorders is currently based on clinical criteria, which have limited sensitivity until most dopaminergic neurons are lost.”
So, they tested the usefulness of DOPA decarboxylase levels in samples in cerebrospinal fluid, for finding Lewy body disease and lowered cognitive performance.
The team recruited 428 participants to search for links between motor disturbances, cognitive difficulties, and damage to the dopamine system in the brain.
Results showed that patients with dopamine system disorders had raised levels of DOPA decarboxylase, which could also be reliably tested in the blood. This link was then verified in 152 further participants.
The team explain that damage to the dopamine system in the brain can be detected through PET scans but they are expensive, complicated and not always available.
“Our results show that DOPA decarboxylase might have a future role in clinical practice as a biomarker of dopaminergic dysfunction to detect Parkinsonian disorders even during the preclinical disease stages and predict their progression to clinical Lewy body disease,” they write.
Professor Hansson commented: ”We have observed that an enzyme in cerebrospinal fluid and in blood is a useful marker for identifying all types of Parkinson’s-related diseases with high accuracy.
”We have used advanced techniques that allow us to measure thousands of proteins simultaneously in a small amount of sample. We found that if a patient has a disorder in the dopamine system, the levels of the biomarker increase, regardless of where they are in the course of the disease.”
Pereira, J. B. et al. DOPA decarboxylase is an emerging biomarker for Parkinsonian disorders including preclinical Lewy body disease. Nature Aging 18 September 2023; doi: 10.1038/s43587-023-00478-y
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