Lewy pathology largely absent in prefrontal cortices of Parkinson’s disease patients undergoing deep brain stimulation

Parkinson's disease (PD) patients undergo deep brain stimulation (DBS) when other treatments are insufficient. Given the patients' advanced clinical stage, an advanced neuropathological stage is assumed. We examined Lewy pathology in prefrontal cortices (PFCs) of DBS recipients. Virtually no Lewy pathology was seen in PD biopsies. In contrast, postmortem PD PFC samples showed significantly greater Lewy pathology than controls. Thus, DBS patients may be less neuropathologically advanced in progression than previously thought.