Patricia Inácio, PhD,  science writer—

Among people in the early stages of Parkinson’s disease, a tool called trabecular bone score, or TBS, may help detect bone loss sooner than the bone mineral density (BMD) exam that’s the current gold standard, according to researchers. Specifically, the TBS tool may work better in assessing the degradation…

A test that uses skin biopsies was able to detect the form of alpha-synuclein protein that causes toxic clumps in the brain of people with Parkinson’s disease and similar conditions in more than 90% of the patients enrolled in a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-sponsored clinical trial.

Note: This story was updated March 27, 2024, to correct that the Michael J. Fox Foundation is not funding the LEARNS study. Merck, known as MSD outside the U.S. and Canada, has joined the observational LEARNS study to investigate the potential of digital biomarkers to evaluate and predict disease…

A $50 million donation to the Baptist Health Foundation is set to expand care for people with Parkinson’s and other neurological diseases across South Florida and to advance research into these disorders. The donation from Kenneth C. Griffin, founder and CEO of the Miami-based hedge fund Citadel,…

U.S.-based Psomagen, a contract research services provider, has announced that it will lead an analysis of data from the 80,000 participants enrolled in the Global Parkinson’s Genetics Program (GP2) — an initiative seeking a better understanding of the genetic underpinnings of Parkinson’s disease. Results from the analysis,…

When asked to quickly assess the number of people in a room, the average person tends to overcount them. In Parkinson’s disease patients with presence hallucinations — the strong sensation of a presence when no one is there — this overestimation is much more heightened when compared with patients…

NodThera’s potential oral therapy for Parkinson’s disease, NT-0796, continues to show promise in countering damaging inflammation in treated patients, according to new findings from a Phase 1b/2a clinical trial. Treatment with NT-0796 for 28 days safely reduced pro-inflammatory markers in the patients’ cerebrospinal fluid (CSF, the liquid surrounding…

Patient enrollment has started in a Phase 1/2 clinical trial evaluating 18F-OP-801, Ashvattha Therapeutics’ investigational imaging agent to visualize brain inflammation in people with Parkinson’s disease and other neurodegenerative conditions, the company said in a press release. The ongoing trial (NCT05395624), which…

Targeting reactive astrocytes — star-shaped cells in the brain that play a supportive role for neurons but can promote brain inflammation when deregulated — could pave the way for novel therapies for neurodegenerative conditions like Parkinson’s disease, according to the findings of a new study. The study found that…

A potential anti-inflammatory therapy for Parkinson’s disease may be evaluated in clinical trials within the next year. The investigative treatment combines a low-dose formulation of interleukin-2 (IL-2) and granulocyte macrophage-colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF), two natural signaling molecules made in the body to help coordinate the activity of immune cells.