Disrupted Sleep in Narcolepsy: Exploring the Integrity of Galanin Neurons in the Ventrolateral Preoptic Area
Gavrilov, Yury V. ; Ellison, Brian A. ; Yamamoto, Mihoko ; Reddy, Hasini ; Haybaeck, Johannes ; Mignot, Emmanuel ; Baumann, Christian R. ; Scammell, Thomas E. ; Valko, Philipp O.
In: Sleep, 2016, vol. 39, no. 5, p. 1059-1062
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- Abstract Study Objectives: To examine the integrity of sleep-promoting neurons of the ventrolateral preoptic nucleus (VLPO) in postmortem brains of narcolepsy type 1 patients. Methods: Postmortem examination of five narcolepsy and eight control brains. Results: VLPO galanin neuron count did not differ between narcolepsy patients (11,151 ± 3,656) and controls (13,526 ± 9,544). Conclusions: A normal number of galanin-immunoreactive VLPO neurons in narcolepsy type 1 brains at autopsy suggests that VLPO cell loss is an unlikely explanation for the sleep fragmentation that often accompanies the disease. Significance Sleep fragmentation is common in narcolepsy type 1 but difficult to explain by orexin deficiency alone. As elderly people with fragmented sleep have a loss of sleep-promoting galanin neurons in the ventrolateral preoptic area (VLPO), we examined the VLPO in people with narcolepsy type 1. We found a normal number of galanin VLPO neurons, suggesting that the fragmented sleep of narcolepsy must arise from another cause.