ABSTRACT
Parkinson’s disease is a movement disorder with cardinal signs
of resting tremor, akinesia and rigidity. These manifest after a
progressive death of many dopaminergic cells in the midbrain.
Although available therapies can mitigate the signs of the disease,
the progression of this cell death has proved difficult to slow or stop,
and the condition is relentlessly progressive. Hence, there is a real
need to develop treatments that slow the pathology of the disease.
Red to infrared light therapy (λ = 600-1070 nm), particularly light in the near-infrared (NIR) range, is emerging as an effective therapy
that is capable of stabilizing dying cells. NIR has become a treatment
for tissue stressed by the known causes of age-related diseases:
hypoxia, toxic environments, and mitochondrial dysfunction. Here
we focus on several issues relating to the use of NIR therapy
for Parkinson’s disease. In particular, we consider the evidence
that NIR mitigates/prevents the degeneration of dopaminergic
cells in the midbrain (the key pathology of the human disease),
the mechanism of this neuroprotection, and finally, the prospect
of using NIR therapy in humans, introducing a novel method of
application. The stage is set for rigorous trial of NIR in Parkinson’s
disease patients, in particular, whether-as in animal models-NIR
provides neuroprotection and slows disease progression, in addition
to mitigating signs.
