Medical News Today : declared in Autoimmunity may have role in Parkinson's disease

For the first time, scientists have found evidence that autoimmunity may have a role in Parkinson's disease. Study co-leader Prof. Alessandro Sette, Center for Infectious Disease, La Jolla Institute for Allergy and ImmunologyLearn how statins may raise the risk of Parkinson's disease. "These findings, however, could provide a much-needed diagnostic test for Parkinson's disease, and could help us to identify individuals at risk or in the early stages of the disease." Worldwide, there are more than 10 million people living with Parkinson's disease, including around a million in the United States. The researchers tested blood samples from 67 patients with Parkinson's disease and control samples from 36 healthy patients.

Best evidence yet that Parkinson's could be autoimmune disease

Sulzer's team plans to try blocking the autoimmune response in Parkinson's, to see if this can stop the disease progressing. R. Bick, B. Poindexter, UT Medical School/SPLEVIDENCE that Parkinson's disease may be an autoimmune disorder could lead to new ways to treat the illness. These findings suggest Parkinson's may be an autoimmune disorder, in which the immune system mistakenly attacks part of the body. However, Parkinson's has been linked to some gene variants that affect how the immune system works, leading to an alternative theory that synuclein causes Parkinson's by triggering the immune system to attack the brain. However, it isn't clear yet if the immune response directly causes neuron death, or if it is merely a side effect of the disease.


Researchers have found the first direct evidence that autoimmunity -- in which the immune system attacks the body's own tissues -- plays a role in Parkinson's disease, the neurodegenerative movement disorder. The findings raise the possibility that the death of neurons in Parkinson's could be prevented by therapies that dampen the immune response. They analyzed the samples to determine which, if any, of the protein fragments triggered an immune response. Dr. Sulzer hypothesizes that autoimmunity in Parkinson's disease arises when neurons are no longer able to get rid of abnormal alpha-synuclein. In particular, the immune response was associated with a common form of a gene found in the immune system, which may explain why many people with Parkinson's disease carry this gene variant.


collected by :Lucy William

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