Dreaming and Parasomnias From a Cerebral Structural View

Abstract

Introduction: Parasomnias are disorders that may appear during sleep with and/or without dreams. To describe them we must take in account a subjective description by the patient and his relatives. Objective measurement of this phenomenology is made with Polysomnography, Electromyography and Holter EKG. Material and Methods: We searched the recent data about parasomnia in the Medline, Pubmed, Google academic databases as also in classic books and reviews. Results: The clinical picture is various from motor and neurological signs to autonomic signs as also sleep related hallucinations. There are more rare presentations with associated disorders due to excretion and involuntary urinary emission during sleep disorders. Parasomnias are often preceded by a traumatic event for the patient and his family members which can be a head trauma or an infection or an intoxication which can be accompanied by psycho vulnerable events. On the other part parasomnias can be themselves a preamble announcing neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson disease, Lewy Body Dementia or some synucleopathies. Conclusions: The fluctuations of neurotransmitters (Dopamine, Serotonine or Acetylcholine) due to specific neurologic pathology can lead to particular parasomnias, their evolution corresponding to each impairment. The knowledge of accompanying parasomnias of neurologic disorders like those from Parkinson disease helps manage diseases of neurological patients already known with Parkinson's disease or other neurological diseases, leading to increased quality of life for these patients as a result of specialized intervention.