LAUSR

Parkinson's disease is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder of dopaminergic striatal neurons in basal ganglia. Treatment of Parkinson's disease (PD) through dopamine replacement strategies may provide improvement in early stages and this treatment response is related to dopaminergic neuronal mass which decreases in advanced stages. This treatment failure was revealed by many studies and levodopa treatment becomes ineffective or toxic in chronic stages of PD. Early diagnosis and neuroprotective agents may be a suitable approach for treatment of PD. The essentials required for early diagnosis are biomarkers. Characterising the striatal neurons, understanding the status of dopaminergic pathways in different PD stages may reveal the effects of drugs used in the treatment. This review describes the update on characterisation of striatal neurons, electrophysiology of dopaminergic pathways in PD, biomarkers of PD, approaches for success of neuroprotective agents in clinical trials. The literature was collected from the articles in database of PubMed, MedLine and other available literature resources.