Effects of unilateral pallidotomy on voluntary movement, and simple and choice reaction times in Parkinson's disease

We studied the effects of unilateral pallidotomy on motor execution and reaction times in patients with moderately advanced Parkinson's disease (PD). Twelve consecutive patients (7 men, 5 women; all right‐handed) underwent left‐side microelectrode‐guided pallidotomy. In addition to clinical rat...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Movement disorders 2003-05, Vol.18 (5), p.515-523
Main Authors: Hayashi, Ryoichi, Hashimoto, Takao, Tada, Tsuyoshi, Ikeda, Shu-ichi
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aged
Attention - physiology
Biological and medical sciences
Choice Behavior
Degenerative and inherited degenerative diseases of the nervous system. Leukodystrophies. Prion diseases
Female
Forearm - physiology
Functional Laterality - physiology
Globus Pallidus - surgery
Hand - physiology
Humans
Male
Medical sciences
Microelectrodes
Middle Aged
motor execution
Muscle, Skeletal - physiology
Neurology
Neurosurgical Procedures - methods
Parkinson Disease - surgery
Parkinson's disease
Postoperative Period
Psychomotor Performance - physiology
reaction time
Reaction Time - physiology
unilateral pallidotomy
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Summary:We studied the effects of unilateral pallidotomy on motor execution and reaction times in patients with moderately advanced Parkinson's disease (PD). Twelve consecutive patients (7 men, 5 women; all right‐handed) underwent left‐side microelectrode‐guided pallidotomy. In addition to clinical rating, reaction time (RT) tests and repetitive movements of the contralesional hand/arm were carried out at baseline and 2 to 3 months after surgery while patients were on optimal medical regimens (on period). The initiation time in both simple reaction time (SRT) and choice reaction time (CRT) improved significantly after pallidotomy (P < 0.05), whereas no effect was observed on the choice processing time, which was calculated by subtracting the mean value of the onset of SRT from that of CRT. Pallidotomy resulted in significant improvement of repetitive movements such as hand pronation/supination and finger‐tapping (P < 0.002, P < 0.005, respectively). Improvements in RT tests and repetitive movements suggest that pallidotomy may enhance attention and motor function. These effects are probably mediated through the pallido‐thalamic‐cortical neural circuitry. © 2003 Movement Disorder Society
ISSN:0885-3185
1531-8257
DOI:10.1002/mds.10389