Movement Disorder News and Research

Latest Movement Disorder News and Research

New discovery about dystonia

Most people who carry a genetic mutation for a movement disorder called dystonia will never develop symptoms, a phenomenon that has puzzled scientists since the first genetic mutation was identified in the 1990's.

5 Aug 2009

New clues about the roots of neurological disease

Switching off a key DNA repair system in the developing nervous system is linked to smaller brain size as well as problems in brain structures vital to movement, memory and emotion, according to new research led by St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists.

27 Jul 2009

Deep brain stimulation for psychiatric disorders

Pioneering therapeutic trials to investigate the effectiveness of deep brain stimulation (DBS) in hard-to-treat depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and Tourette's syndrome are underway at multiple medical centers around the world, according to a review in the June 2009 issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings.

30 Jun 2009

Telemedicine expands reach of care for Parkinson’s patients

A unique and innovative telemedicine project is providing distant nursing home patients with Parkinson's disease access to neurologists at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC).A pilot study of the project - the results of which were released this month at the International Congress of Parkinson's Disease and Movement Disorders in Paris - demonstrates that the system can improve the quality of life and motor function of patients.

17 Jun 2009

Biovail acquires worldwide rights to Tetrabenazine

Biovail Corporation today announced a wholly owned subsidiary has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire worldwide development and commercialization rights to the entire portfolio of tetrabenazine products, including Xenazine/Nitoman (tetrabenazine tablets), and the associated intellectual property rights held by Cambridge Laboratories (Ireland) Ltd and its affiliates.

18 May 2009

Merck Serono starts second phase III trial of Safinamide in advanced Parkinson's

Merck Serono announced today the initiation of the SETTLE study. This study will evaluate the efficacy and safety of a dose range of safinamide (50-100 mg once daily) as add-on therapy to a stable dose of levodopa, in mid- to late-stage Parkinson's disease patients with motor fluctuations compared to placebo.

7 May 2009

Shedding some light on Parkinson's treatment

A research team lead by Karl Deisseroth in the bioengineering department at Stanford University has developed a technique to systematically characterize disease circuits in the brain.

16 Apr 2009

Cognitive behavioral therapy helps alleviate nonepileptic seizures

Researchers at Rhode Island Hospital have found that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) can reduce the frequency of seizures in patients with psychogenic nonepileptic seizures (PNES), along with improving their overall quality of life.

15 Apr 2009

Deep brain stimulation effective for patients with primary generalized dystonia

A new study from Mount Sinai School of Medicine finds that deep brain stimulation (DBS) is a safe and effective treatment for patients with primary generalized dystonia (PGD).

14 Apr 2009

RNA interference can be used to silence genes selectively - potential for Huntington's disease therapy

Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers have designed tiny RNA molecules that shut off the gene that causes Huntington's disease without damaging that gene's healthy counterpart, which maintains the health and vitality of neurons.

12 Apr 2009

University of Florida doctors test targets for Parkinson surgery

Doctors may be able to tailor a specialized form of brain surgery to more closely match the needs of Parkinson patients, according to results from the first large-scale effort to compare the two current target areas of deep brain stimulation surgery, or DBS.

15 Mar 2009

FDA requires boxed warning and risk mitigation strategy for metoclopramide-containing drugs

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced today that manufacturers of metoclopramide, a drug used to treat gastrointestinal disorders, must add a boxed warning to their drug labels about the risk of its long-term or high-dose use.

1 Mar 2009

Safinamide significantly improved motor function in patients with advanced Parkinson's disease

Merck Serono, a division of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, and its partner Newron Pharmaceuticals SpA has announced that the first Phase III trial of investigational agent safinamide as adjunctive therapy to levodopa (study 016) met its primary endpoint by increasing daily "ON" time in mid- to late-stage Parkinson's disease patients with motor fluctuations by 1.3 hours.

5 Feb 2009

Pregnancy-related hormonal changes linked to increased risk of restless legs syndrome

A study in the Feb. 1 issue of the journal Sleep shows that the elevation in estradiol levels that occurs during pregnancy is more pronounced in pregnant women with restless legs syndrome (RLS) than in controls.

2 Feb 2009

Early treatment with rasagiline (Azilect) for Parkinson's best

There is hope that the drug rasagiline can do what no other medication for Parkinson's disease now does -- slow the progression of a devastating degenerative brain disease that eventually robs people of their ability to move and function.

27 Jan 2009

Deep brain stimulation helps advanced Parkinson's disease patients

Patients with advanced Parkinson disease (PD) who received deep brain stimulation treatment had more improvement in movement skills and quality of life after six months than patients who received other medical therapy, but also had a higher risk of a serious adverse events, according to a study in the January 7 issue of JAMA.

6 Jan 2009

FDA issues complete response letter to Ipsen for Dysport BLA

Ipsen has announced that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a Complete Response Letter for its Biologics License Application (BLA) for its Botulinum toxin Type A, Dysport.

30 Dec 2008

Paliperidone palmitate shows positive results for treatment of schizophrenia

Paliperidone palmitate, an investigational long-acting therapy (LAT) demonstrated statistically significant symptom control compared with placebo according to the results of a 13-week study.

14 Dec 2008

Losing sense of smell may indicate Parkinson's

Many individuals with Parkinson's disease are able to recall losing their sense of smell well before the onset of more commonly recognized symptoms such as tremors, impaired dexterity, speech problems, memory loss and decreased cognitive ability.

12 Dec 2008

Cambridge Labs announces Spanish approval of Tetrabenazine

Cambridge Laboratories Limited has announced that its flagship product Tetrabenazine, (known as NITOMAN in Germany and other key European territories and XENAZINE in the UK, U.S. and other markets) has received marketing approval in Spain from the Agencia Espanola de Medicamentos y Productos Sanitarios.

8 Dec 2008