Sleep medicine
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Multicenter Study Clinical Trial
Validation of the Augmentation Severity Rating Scale (ASRS): a multicentric, prospective study with levodopa on restless legs syndrome.
Augmentation is the main complication during long-term dopaminergic treatment of restless legs syndrome (RLS) and reflects an overall increase in RLS severity. Its severity varies considerably from a minor problem to a devastating exacerbation of disease. Despite its clinical relevance, systematic evaluations have rarely been undertaken and there has been no development of methods to assess the severity of augmentation. To fill this gap, the European RLS Study Group (EURLSSG) has developed the Augmentation Severity Rating Scale (ASRS), using three items that assess the degree of change in three specific dimensions of augmentation. The changes in each dimension are summed to give an ASRS total score. ⋯ The ASRS is a reliable and valid scale to measure the severity of augmentation. Due to the need to systematically quantify augmentation for both long-term efficacy and tolerability, the ASRS may become a useful tool to monitor augmentation in future clinical trials.
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Review
RLS assessment and sleep questionnaires in practice--lessons learned from Parkinson's disease.
In recent years, a whole range of interesting and useful scales have been made available for the assessment of patients with restless legs syndrome (RLS). These can be more or less divided into severity scales (IRLS, RLS-6, JHSS), quality of life scales, and instruments for specific details (e.g. to improve diagnostic accuracy; RLS-DI), or to assess the presence and severity of augmentation (ASRS, SIDA). This manuscript reviews these scales, their specific strengths and weaknesses, validation status and results of their use in RLS populations. Specific scales are already well established in Parkinson's disease, and a more widespread and frequent use of scales and questionnaires will also enhance clinical care and long-term monitoring of patients with RLS.
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Review
Improving RLS diagnosis and severity assessment: polysomnography, actigraphy and RLS-sleep log.
Restless legs syndrome (RLS) has proven to often have both a difficult differential diagnosis and also problems with assessing severity. These problems contribute to some of the confusion about medication effects on RLS and also to the large placebo effect seen in clinical trials. We need to find better diagnostic and evaluative methods. ⋯ The diagnostic sensitivity and specificity for these measures is about the same as that for MSLT diagnosis of narcolepsy and the use of these tests deserves to be reconsidered. (2) Leg activity measures provide an attractive less costly and more accessible alternative to the polysomnogram and can be used on repeated nights, reducing measurement problems occurring because of the well-recognized variability in symptom expression across days. (3) RLS-logs provide a more concurrent assessment of RLS symptom occurrence that provide a more direct measure of severity than questionnaires completed at clinic visits. Similar logs have been found useful in evaluating other sensory disorders such as headache. These methods need to be developed and evaluated in both our research and clinical trials of RLS because they may enhance accuracy of diagnosis and reduce the placebo response to treatments.
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Augmentation of symptom severity is the main complication of dopaminergic treatment of restless legs syndrome (RLS). The current article reports on the considerations of augmentation that were made during a European Restless Legs Syndrome Study Group (EURLSSG)-sponsored Consensus Conference in April 2006 at the Max Planck Institute (MPI) in Munich, Germany, the conclusions of which were endorsed by the International RLS Study Group (IRLSSG) and the World Association of Sleep Medicine (WASM). The Consensus Conference sought to develop a better understanding of augmentation and generate a better operational definition for its clinical identification. ⋯ The Consensus Conference agreed upon new operational criteria for the clinical diagnosis of RLS augmentation: the MPI diagnostic criteria for augmentation. Areas needing further consideration for validating these criteria and for understanding the underlying biology of RLS augmentation are indicated.
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Sleep apnea syndrome (SAS), a common disorder, is characterized by repetitive episodes of cessation of breathing during sleep, resulting in hypoxemia and sleep disruption. The consequences of the abnormal breathing during sleep include daytime sleepiness, neurocognitive dysfunction, development of cardiovascular disorders, metabolic dysfunction, and impaired quality of life. There are two types of SAS: obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) and central sleep apnea syndrome (CSAS). ⋯ The diagnosis of SAS requires assessment of subjective symptoms and apneic episodes during sleep documented by polysomnography. Treatments of OSAS include continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), oral appliances, and surgery; patients with CSAS are treated with oxygen, adaptive servo-ventilation, or CPAP. With assessment and treatment of the SAS, patients usually have resolution of their disabling symptoms, subsequently resulting in improved quality of life.