Non motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease

2/2/24, 7 mins reading

Parkinson’s disease is defined as a movement disorder and is characterized by motor dysfunctions such as tremors, muscle rigidity, and balancing issues. However, Parkinson’s disease patients also present a wide spectrum of nonmotor symptoms. These non-motor symptoms may occur before or after motor symptoms. They can be classified into 3 subgroups:

Mental health symptoms:

• Cognitive deficit

• Memory problems

• Fatigue 

• Sleep problems

• Anxiety 

• Depression

• Apathy

Autonomic nervous system symptoms The autonomic nervous system involuntarily regulates unconscious tasks such as heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, digestion, sexual desire, etc.

• Drooling

• Constipation

• Urinary dysfunctions

• Perspiration

• Erectile dysfunction

• Orthostatic hypotension and labile hypertension

Sensory symptoms

• Loss of smell

• Pain

• Numbness or tingling

• Visual hallucinations and double vision

In summary There has been a variety of hypotheses regarding causes of non-motor symptoms. One of them is that, in addition to the substantia nigra of the brain, other parts of the brain such as the dorsal vagal nucleus, hypothalamus, olfactory tubercle, autonomic nervous system, etc may also be involved in the pathogenesis of Parkinson’s disease. As a result of it, the pathological changes of these parts lead to nonmotor symptoms the above mentioned.

Besides, nonmotor symptoms may also come from drugs that are taken by Parkinson’s Disease patients as a part of medication, which is called drug-induced non-motor symptoms.