17 Jun Restless Legs Syndrome and Increased Risk of Death

MedicalResearch.com Interview with Yanping Li, PhD
Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School
Department of Medicine
Channing Division of Network Medicine
Boston, MA

MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study?

Answer: During 8 years of follow-up, we observed that men with RLS had a 30% increased risk of death.

MedicalResearch.com: Were any of the findings unexpected?

Answer: Based on our hypothesis, we would like to observed a higher risk of death from cardiovascular diseases, but we do not.

What should clinicians and patients take away from your report?

Answer: RLS is a medical disorder that may cause early death, both clinicians and patients should pay more attention on RLS, which has been lack of attention and under-diagnosed for long time.

MedicalResearch.com: What recommendations do you have for future research as a result of this study?

Answer: Future research exploring the pathophysiological relationship between RLS mortality, especially cause-specific mortality are warranted.

Citation:

Prospective study of restless legs syndrome and mortality among men                

Li Y, Wang W, Winkelman JW, Malhotra A, Ma J, Gao X.

From The Channing Laboratory (Y.L., J.M., X.G.) and the Division of Sleep Medicine (J.W.W., A.M.), Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA; Department of Otolaryngology (W.W.), Tianjin First Central Hospital, Tianjin, China; and Department of Nutrition (W.W., X.G.), Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA.

Neurology. 2013 Jun 12.
[Epub ahead of print]

Last Updated on March 19, 2014 by Marie Benz MD FAAD