Research Discovery: A protein called DOPA decarboxylase (DDC), which exists in cerebrospinal fluid, could be a quantitative biomarker for diagnosing Lewy body dementia (LBD) and Parkinson’s disease.
Diseases Affected: Lewy body dementia and Parkinson's disease.
Key Findings: Patients with LBD or Parkinson’s had 2.5 times higher concentrations of DDC in their cerebrospinal fluid than healthy patients. These levels are not seen in Alzheimer’s, which causes similar symptoms.
What's next? This study acknowledges some limitations, and advancing the discovery to clinical implementation would require further studies that are able to account for factors such as differing disease stages and possible associations with serotonergic dysfunction in different diseases.
We’re funding research to identify biomarkers for Lewy body dementia (LBD). In the meantime, a team at @amsterdamumc.bsky.social has identified the protein DOPA decarboxylase as a possible biomarker that differentiates #LBD from Alzheimer’s.
