Parkinson's Disease Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Parkinson's Disease, including details on symptoms, treatment, genetics, medication.

Effect of medical and surgical interventions on health-related quality of life in Parkinson's disease.

Martinez-Martin P, Deuschl G

Unit of Neuroepidemiology, National Centre for Epidemiology, Carlos III Institute of Health, Madrid, Spain. pmartinez@isciii.es

Motor-related parameters are the standard outcome parameters for treatment interventions. Nonetheless, subjective appraisals about the consequences of treatment on health-related quality of life (HRQoL) are meanwhile established and may uncover important aspects of interventions. We have reviewed the literature with a defined search strategy and collected 61 clinical trials, which have used HRQoL as a planned outcome parameter. The articles were rated similarly as for the Task Force report of the Movement Disorder Society on interventions for Parkinson's disease (PD), but the relevant outcome parameter was HRQoL. We found that unilateral pallidotomy, deep brain stimulation of the subthalamic nucleus, and rasagiline are efficacious to improve the HRQoL of PD patients. For many other interventions, the efficacy to improve HRQoL in the PD setting cannot be considered to be proven so far. HRQoL should be part of future trial designs and more research is necessary to understand the determinants of QoL in PD.

Published 1 May 2007 in Mov Disord, 22(6): 757-65.
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