Sleep Research Centre, Department of Neurology IC, Oasi Institute for Research on Mental Retardation and Brain Aging, IRCCS, Troina, Italy.
Sleep Med. 2012 Apr;13(4):433-41. doi: 10.1016/j.sleep.2011.10.027. Epub 2012 Feb 9.
This paper evaluates, in both the theoretical and practical frameworks, the value of the application of the current criteria for the scoring of leg movement activity during sleep, recorded in clinical and research settings, for the study of restless legs syndrome (RLS) and other conditions. Recently, new parameters have been introduced to better describe the time structure of leg movement activity during sleep. The periodicity index, the distribution of inter-movement intervals, and the hourly distribution of periodic leg movements during sleep have emerged as valuable descriptors. Therefore, the additional value provided by the new methods is discussed with a glance at the rationale behind these new approaches. It is concluded that these new methods have proven to be able to provide new insights into the phenomenon of leg movement activity during sleep. In particular, the classical periodic leg movements during sleep (PLMS) index does not seem to be sufficiently specific for the diagnosis and clinical significance of RLS. The specificity of PLMS for the diagnosis of RLS can be significantly increased by considering these additional parameters. The same parameters also allow a more detailed analysis of several aspects of RLS and PLMS that were impossible to perform before on the basis of the simple PLMS index alone.
本文从理论和实践框架两方面评估了当前睡眠期间腿部运动活动评分标准在研究不宁腿综合征（RLS）和其他疾病中的应用价值。最近，已经引入了新的参数来更好地描述睡眠期间腿部运动活动的时间结构。周期性指数、运动间隔分布以及睡眠期间周期性腿部运动的每小时分布已成为有价值的描述符。因此，本文简要讨论了这些新方法背后的原理，探讨了新方法提供的额外价值。结论认为，这些新方法已被证明能够为睡眠期间腿部运动活动的现象提供新的见解。特别是，经典的睡眠周期性腿部运动（PLMS）指数对于 RLS 的诊断和临床意义似乎不够特异。通过考虑这些附加参数，可以显著提高 PLMS 对 RLS 的诊断特异性。这些相同的参数还允许对 RLS 和 PLMS 的几个方面进行更详细的分析，这些方面以前仅基于简单的 PLMS 指数是无法进行的。
