Movement disorders in Huntington’s disease are often medically refractive. The aim of the trial was assessment of procedure safety of deep brain stimulation, equality of internal- and external-pallidal stimulation and efficacy followed-up for 6 months in a prospective pilot trial.
In a controlled double-blind phase six patients (four chorea-dominant, two Westphal-variant) with predominant movement disorder were randomly assigned to either the sequence of 6-week internal- or 6-week external-pallidal stimulation, or vice versa, followed by further 3 months chronic pallidal stimulation at the target with best effect-side-effect ratio. Primary endpoints were changes in the Unified Huntington’s Disease Rating Scale motor-score, chorea subscore, and total motor-score 4 (blinded-video ratings), comparing internal- versus external-pallidal stimulation, and 6 months versus baseline. Secondary endpoints assessed scores on dystonia, hypokinesia, cognition, mood, functionality/disability, and quality-of-life.
Intention-to-treat analysis of all patients (
Pallidal deep brain stimulation was demonstrated to be a safe treatment option for the reduction of chorea in Huntington’s disease. Their effects on chorea and dystonia and on quality-of-life should be examined in larger controlled trials.