Circadian system disturbances in Huntington’s disease – implications for light therapy

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Authors: D. Pačesová ^1,2; S. Moravcová ^1,2; J. Kopřivová ¹; Z. Bendová ^1,2
Authors‘ workplace: Národní ústav duševního zdraví, Klecany ¹; Přírodovědecká fakulta, UK Praha ²
Published in: Cesk Slov Neurol N 2019; 82(3): 289-294
Category: Review Article
doi: https://doi.org/10.14735/amcsnn2019289

Overview

Huntington disease (HD) is an autosomal-dominant, hereditary neurodegenerative disease with a fatal prognosis. Besides the typical progressive deterioration of motor functions, cognitive and behavioral disorders can also be observed in patients with HD. The most common symptoms also include sleep disorders that seriously affect the quality of life of the patients but also of their relatives and which are being associated with a disrupted circadian system. Stabilization of sleep lenght and quality by strengthening the circadian system could mitigate or suppress many HD symptoms, which, although being a direct result of the disease etiology, can secondarily be heightened by long-term insufficient sleep or circadian system disturbances. Such interventions could lead to slower especially cognitive symptom progression or onset in pre-manifesting patients. Synchronizing bright light therapy, which has already proven useful as a complementary tool for the treatment of affective disorders, as well as some neurodegenerative diseases, could lead to radical improvement of the patients’ quality of life, at least in the early stages of disease development.

The authors declare they have no potential conflicts of interest concerning drugs, products, or services used in the study.

The Editorial Board declares that the manuscript met the ICMJE “uniform requirements” for biomedical papers.

Keywords:

Huntington disease – circadian system – clock genes – sleep – light therapy

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