Study finds difference in blood immune cells in patients with Parkinson’s disease. She advocates the development of new drugs to regulate the immune system and thereby inhibit brain deterioration.
Confirming a growing theory that Parkinson’s disease is not only a disease of the brain, but also related to the immune system, a new study conducted by the Department of Biomedicine at the University of Aarhus, Denmark, showed that immune cells in the blood behaved differently in patients with Parkinson’s disease.
The study published in the scientific journal Movement Disorders advocates complementary medicine to regulate the immune system and thereby inhibit brain deterioration.
“There is a growing theory that Parkinson’s disease is not only a disease of the brain, but also a link with the immune system,” says Marina Romero-Ramos, associate professor of neuroscience, who leads the team in charge of the study. study. She points out that the new information found could in the long term lead to the development of an additional immunoregulatory treatment that can be combined with current medical treatment. Currently, doctors administer the drug L-dopa, which only affects the brain and the symptoms of the disease.
Additional immune-regulatory therapy may slow disease progression
Sara Konstantin Nissen, a scientist associated with the study, says that additional immunoregulatory treatment in patients with Parkinson’s disease could also help slow the progression of the disease. She explains that the immune system operates in a delicate balance whereby it cleans up invading microorganisms and unwanted protein buildups, such as alpha-synuclein, creating an inflammatory state. On the other hand, the immune system must also avoid damaging the cells of the body through too much inflammation. Apparently, this balance deteriorates in the case of Parkinson’s disease.
Sara Konstantin Nissen adds that in research circles, it is believed that immune cells in the blood, which contain (or express) a certain receptor called CD163 on their surface, migrate into the brains of patients with Parkinson’s disease. These cells are said to help clean up buildups of alpha-synuclein that damage the brain. But with the new study, it is now suggested that the cells in question are already incorrectly regulated in the blood before reaching the brain. This led the researchers to conclude that it might be possible to slow the degeneration of neurons in the brains of patients with Parkinson’s disease by regulating the immune system through drugs.
Parkinson’s disease is characterized by the slow degeneration of neurons in the brain due to the abnormal accumulation of a protein called alpha-synuclein. This causes patients to experience tremors and slow, stiff movements that many people associate with the condition. Researchers from the Department of Biomedicine at the University of Aarhus, Denmark, took blood samples from 29 patients with Parkinson’s disease and 20 control subjects for the protein alpha-synuclein to test whether immune cells in the blood of Parkinson’s patients regulate cell surface immune markers and whether they are also less efficient at secreting anti-inflammatory molecules than control cells.
New ways to prevent or delay the development of Parkinson’s disease
Sara Konstantin Nissen believes that while the study will help develop new drugs for patients who have already been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, it will also help doctors and researchers develop new methods to prevent or delay the development of Parkinson’s disease.
The study suggests that people with REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD), a condition in which patients are at an increased risk of developing Parkinson’s disease, can now be monitored and put on immune medication if they show signs of Parkinson’s disease.
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