Quantitative Appraisal of Ventricular Cerebrospinal Fluid Biomarkers in Neuropathologically Diagnosed Parkinson's Disease Cases Lacking Alzheimer's Disease Pathology

Identifying biomarkers that distinguish Parkinson’s disease (PD) from normal control (NC) individuals has the potential to increase diagnostic sensitivity for the detection of early-stage PD. A previous proteomic study identified potential biomarkers in postmortem ventricular cerebrospinal fluid (V-CSF) from neuropathologically diagnosed PD subjects lacking Alzheimer’s disease (AD) neuropathology. In the present study, we assessed these biomarkers as well as p-tau181, Aβ42, and S100B by ELISA in PD (n = 43) and NC (n = 49) cases. The p-tau181/A 42 ratio and ApoA-1 showed statistically significant differences between groups. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that p-tau181/Aβ42 had a significant odds ratio: OR = 1.42 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.12–1.84), P = 0.006. Among the molecules investigated, intriguing correlations were observed that require further investigation. Our results suggest co-existent AD CSF biomarkers within the PD group notwithstanding that it was selected to minimize AD neuropathological lesions.