F084 Body mass index (BMI) trajectories in the course of manifest HD

<h3>Background</h3> Weight loss is a common characteristic of Huntington’s Disease (HD). Weight loss in HD is a complex issue with a multifactorial root cause. Treatment options appear to have reasonable efficacy but most centre on increasing calorie intake without addressing other issues, and are poorly tolerated. But how common and serious is the issue of weight loss in HD? <h3>Aims</h3> Use the Enroll-HD Periodic Dataset (PDS6) to map the average Body Mass Index (BMI) trajectory of people with manifest HD. <h3>Methods</h3> PDS6 data was imported into R Studio, and curated to focus on people with manifest HD who were not taking any forms of medication or a prescribed high calorie diet. This data was then analysed to map the average trajectory of the BMI of a person with manifest HD. <h3>Results</h3> The resulting boxplot (figure 1) suggests that BMI remains relatively stable for the first few years of having manifest HD, but that without medication or a prescribed diet, weight can quickly be lost and BMI can drop dramatically as a result. These results were not replicated in a cohort included people taking medication and high calorie diets (figure 2). <h3>Conclusions</h3> The average person with manifest HD will experience significant weight loss challenges during the course of the disease. Current treatments are reasonably efficacious but ignore the deeper contributors to this problem. Increased vigilance and monitoring amongst clinicians should be employed to manage these deficits as soon as they emerge.