Original articleFerritin subunits in CSF are decreased in restless legs syndrome
Section snippets
Patient characteristics
This is an Institutional Review Board-approved study. The research was carried out according to the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. Informed consent was obtained from all participants. We used CSF collected from a total of 39 persons at Johns Hopkins University, 25 who were found to have RLS (12 early onset RLS and 13 late-onset RLS) and 14 control subjects who did not have RLS. The LPs were all performed at 10 pm in the evening at a time when symptoms are maximal. The patients fit
Results
The specificity of the H- and L-monoclonal antibodies is shown in Fig 1. Human spleen ferritin was used as a control for the primary antibodies on both blots, because it contains both H- and L-ferritins, in a ratio of approximately 10% to 20% H-ferritin and 80% to 90% L-ferritin.20, 28, 29, 30, 31 The H-ferritin antibody is less sensitive than the L-ferritin antibody in detecting human spleen ferritin, consistent with the ratio of H-ferritin to L-ferritin and with previous characterizations of
Discussion
We have established that both H- and L-ferritin subunits are decreased in early onset RLS. These data are consistent with previous reports4 and extend the findings to the individual ferritin subunits. The data provide further support for the notion that RLS is a disorder related to insufficient iron at the level of the CNS.4, 32 We also established that total protein amounts in RLS CSF are normal—an important piece of information in elucidating the pathology of RLS. Changes in total CSF protein
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Supported by NIH/NCRR Grant M01-RR-02719 (Johns Hopkins GCRC) and by NIH Grant RO1-NS038704, Dopaminergic Function in Restless Legs Syndrome (C. Earley, PI).