Objective: To evaluate the differences in early sleep architecture between patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) and Parkinson’s disease associated dementia (PDD).

Background: Disorders of sleep and wakefulness are a recognized manifestation of PD and are often present in a premotor phase. However, sleep architecture in PD and its relation to the development of dementia has not yet been thoroughly studied.

Methods: Patients were recruited from the movement disorders clinic of Centro Hospitalar do Porto, Portugal, as part of a longitudinal study on sleep in PD. All participants underwent baseline (drug-naïve) polysomnographic recording (PSG) and extensive clinical evaluation. The clinical diagnosis was reviewed. We then compared the clinical and sleep data from PD versus PDD patients, using Mann-Whitney U-test or Chi-Square test when appropriate.

Results: We found 24 patients. Parkinsonism disappeared or was excluded in 3 patients. Out of the remaining 21, 8 were male and 13 were female. The final diagnosis was PD in 16 patients and PDD in 5, after a mean follow-up of 11 ± 6.45 years. The mean age of patients and mean disease duration at baseline PSG was 63.90 ± 9.02 years and 4.38 ± 8.38 years, respectively. No differences were found between baseline UPDRS, Hoehn and Yahr, Northwestern University Disability Scale and MMS between both groups. There were no significant differences between arousals, sleep latency, REM latency and duration, duration of sleep in stages 1-2 and 3-4 and duration of NREM. 

Conclusions: Our study failed to find differences in early sleep architecture between drug-naïve patients with PD versus PDD based on PSG variables analysis. The small sample size and different disease stages could account for these results.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/sleep-architecture-in-parkinsons-disease-and-parkinsons-disease-associated-dementia/