The Auditory System Involvement in Parkinson Disease: Electrophysiological and Neuropsychological Correlations

Abstract

In the course of Parkinson disease (PD), apart from motor symptoms, presence of mental disturbances such as dementia and depression is common. The aims of this study were to assess the auditory system involvement in patients with PD using electrophysiological and neuropsychological tests and to correlate the cognitive impairment and the auditory evoked potentials tests results. The auditory and cognitive functions were studied in 53 patients with idiopathic PD, mean age 65.8 +/- 9.1 years; mean disease duration 7.8 +/- 5.0 years; mean motor disability score 2.5 +/- 0.8 points in Hoehn-Yahr scale compared with a control group matched for age and sex. In patients and controls, cognitive functions were analyzed electrophysiologically using middle latency auditory evoked potentials (MLAEP) and long latency (event-related potentials, P300) auditory evoked potentials. Neuropsychological testing consisted of Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST). According to WCST results, patients with PD were divided into 2 subgroups: patients with normal and abnormal WCST performance (WCST(-) and WCST(+) subgroups, respectively). Sixteen of 46 patients (34.8%) showed cognitive impairment when evaluated with WCST. Statistically significant differences in middle latency auditory evoked potentials and P300 results between WCST(-) and WCST(+) groups were found consisting of P300 abnormalities in 93.8% patients in WCST(+) and 57.7% in WCST(-) group. Middle latency auditory evoked potentials were abnormal in 71.4% and 63% patients in WCST(+) and WCST(-) group, respectively. P300 was absent significantly more often (P < 0.01) in the subgroup with cognitive impairment. The difference in middle latency auditory evoked potentials results between these subgroups was statistically insignificant. The auditory evoked potentials changes were more common among patients with abnormal WCST performance. According to our results, the auditory evoked potentials of different latencies are helpful in the assessment of cognitive changes accompanying PD.

Auditory- and Vestibular-Evoked Potentials Correlate with Motor and Non-Motor Features of Parkinson’s Disease

“…The high-frequency hearing impairment associated with PD was detected in the current work similar to prior studies ( 26 – 28 ). Impaired hearing in PD was attributed to peripheral auditory dysfunction ( 27 , 28 ) and abnormal central auditory processing ( 29 , 30 ). Likewise, abnormal BAEPs among PD patients were demonstrated inconsistent to previous studies, denoting brainstem auditory conduction delay ( 26 , 31 , 32 ).…”

“…Likewise, correlation of other non-motor features poorly linked to brainstem dysfunction such as cardiovascular symptoms, attention/memory, and perception/hallucination could be explained by associated disease severity ( 42 ). Cognitive deficits of PD are correlated to higher order auditory processing in subcortical–cortical pathways evaluated by event-related potentials (P300) ( 29 , 44 ).…”

Electro-Physiological Approaches to Monitoring Neuro- Degenerative Diseases

“…Middle latency auditory evoked potentials are abnormal in most PD patient. P300 is absent significantly more often in PD patients with cognitive impairment [64].…”

Delayed latencies of auditory evoked potential P300 are associated with the severity of Parkinson's disease in older patients

“…UPDRS I scores evaluates losses in mental functions (mentation, behavior and mood) that influence the generation of P300 10,24 . Previous studies have shown a positive correlation between the prolongation of P300 latencies in PD and deficits in memory, attention, executive functions, and depression 6,7,25,26 . The authors suggest that prolonged P300 latencies are correlated to cognitive impairment 7 and behavioral problems 27 in PD patients.…”