Impulsivity traits and awareness of motor intention in Parkinson's disease: a proof-of-concept study.

Introduction: In patients with Parkinson's disease (PD), impulsivity is still a matter of investigation. It has been hypothesized that impulsive personality traits may favour impulse control disorder (ICD) onset during dopaminergic therapy. In healthy subjects, a relationship between the awareness of motor intention and impulsive personality traits assessed by the Barratt impulsivity scale (BIS-11) has been reported.

Prevalence and impact of COVID-19 in Parkinson's disease: evidence from a multi-center survey in Tuscany region.

Background: If Parkinson's Disease (PD) may represent a risk factor for Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is debated and there are few data on the direct and indirect effects of this pandemic in PD patients.

Objective: In the current study we evaluated the prevalence, mortality and case-fatality of COVID-19 in a PD cohort, also exploring possible risk factors. We also aimed to investigate the effect of lockdown on motor/non-motor symptoms in PD patients as well as their acceptability/accessibility to telemedicine.

Therapy of episodic ataxias: case report and review of the literature.

Episodic ataxias (EAs) are characterized by recurrent, discrete episodes of vertigo and ataxia. EA1 and EA2 are the two most common forms. In the interictal interval, myokymia is typically present in EA1, whereas EA2 patients present with interictal nystagmus.

Daytime course of sleepiness in de novo Parkinson's disease patients.

Normal subjects show an increase of sleepiness in the morning, early afternoon and before sleep. In the advanced stages of Parkinson's disease (PD) the mean level of sleepiness is quite high, while with respect to healthy subjects it seems to be unchanged in the early stages. The aim of this study was to evaluate the time-course of the sleepiness level during the wakefulness period in untreated patients with early-stage Parkinson's disease.

Osteoporosis and Parkinson's disease.

Parkinson's disease (PD) and osteoporosis are two conditions with a quite high prevalence in older people. From the literature we learn that in parkinsonian people there a is e major reduction of Bone Mass Density (BMD) compared to age-matched controls. A low BMD is one of the factors related to fracture's frequency in PD patients besides an increased risk of falls.

Complex repetitive behavior: punding after bilateral subthalamic nucleus stimulation in Parkinson's disease.

"Punding" is the term used to describe a stereotyped motor behavior characterized by an intense fascination with repetitive purposeless movements, such as taking apart mechanical objects, handling common objects as if they were new and entertaining, constantly picking at oneself, etc. As a phenomenon with both impulsive and compulsive features, the phenomenology of punding is currently being questioned. In order to investigate the pathophysiology of this phenomenon, we screened a population of Parkinson's disease (PD) outpatients who underwent subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation (STN DBS).