The American Academy of Sleep Medicine presents a webcast on REM Sleep Behavior Disorder (RBD). RBD is parasomnia characterized by dream enactment in the context of loss of physiological atonia during REM sleep. RBD is of particular importance to sleep medicine, neurology, and neurosciences as it is one of the earliest manifestations of α-synuclein related neurodegeneration. The majority of patients with isolated RBD eventually develop Parkinson’s disease, dementia with Lewy bodies, or multiple system atrophy.

Part 1 will highlight clinical aspects of the disorder, its diagnosis, pathophysiology, and treatment.

Part 2 will focus on the associations between RBD and neurodegeneration and the significance of the RBD population for upcoming clinical trials to slow the progression of neurodegenerative disorders associated with RBD.

Upon completion of this activity, participants will be able to: 

• Recognize clinical characteristics, diagnosis, differential diagnosis, and treatment of RBD 
• Understand associations between RBD and neurodegenerative disorders 
• Understand important aspects of clinical trials in the RBD population 

Miranda M. Lim, MD, PhD
Dr. Lim is an associate professor in neurology at Oregon Health & Science University and a staff neurologist and research investigator at the VA Portland Health Care System. She completed fellowship training in sleep medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, pursuing postdoctoral research that identified a novel dietary therapy for the treatment of sleep-wake disturbances following mild traumatic brain injury (TBI), and she was awarded the Sleep Research Society Young Investigator Award for this work. Dr. Lim is currently supported by VA, DoD, NSF, and NIH to perform translational sleep research on rodent models and human subjects.

Elena Antelmi, MD, PhD
Dr. Antelmi is an assistant professor in the Parkinson Disease and Movement Disorders Division at the University of Verona in Italy. Dr. Antelmi’s main fields of clinical and scientific interest are sleep medicine and movement disorders. Her research is mainly focused on prodromal synucleinopathy and particularly on REM sleep behavior disorder and biomarkers of phenoconversions, along with other sleep related disorders like restless legs syndrome, hypersomnia and narcolepsy. She also does research on hyperkinetic movement disorders and particularly on dystonia and neurophysiology of dystonia. She is the author of more than 100 articles in international peer-reviewed journals.

Joan Santamaria, MD, PhD
Dr. Santamaria is the Emeritus Researcher at the Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBAPS) in Barcelona, affiliated with the Hospital Clinic of Barcelona, where he worked for most of his career. In 1988 he started the Clinical Neurophysiology and Sleep Laboratory at the Hospital Clinic of Barcelona where he completed most of his research on sleep and neurological diseases in collaboration with Drs. Eduard Tolosa, Alex Iranzo, Francesc Graus and Josep Dalmau. His work on clinical imaging and neurophysiological evaluation of REM sleep behavior disorder, in frequent cooperation with the Neurological Department of Innsbruck University, has contributed significantly to the advancement of the field.

Ron Postuma, MD
Dr. Postuma is a professor of neurology at McGill University. He graduated with his medical degree from the University of Manitoba, completed a neurology fellowship at McGill University, a movement disorders research fellowship at the University of Toronto, and a Masters in Epidemiology at McGill. He is a clinical movement disorders specialist, with a research interest mainly centered around non-motor aspects of Parkinson's disease. Main areas of interest include early detection of PD, diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders including REM sleep behavior disorder, diagnosis and diagnostic criteria for PD, and clinical trials in the early stages of PD.

Ambra Stefani, MD
Dr. Stefani is a neurologist working at the Medical University of Innsbruck, Austria. After completing her medical studies at the University of Verona, Italy, she started her career as researcher in sleep medicine in 2013 at the Medical University of Innsbruck, Austria, in the sleep lab lead by Professor Birgit Högl. Her main research interests are related to video-polysomnographic characterization of motor phenomena during sleep, with a special focus on iRBD (clinical, video-polysomnographic and biomarker characterization) and restless legs syndrome (clinical, laboratory, and imaging-based characterization). Her publications record now stands at more than 80 peer-reviewed publications.

Aleksandar Videnovic, MD, MSc
Dr. Videnovic is an associate professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, chief of the Division of Sleep Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), and director of the MGH Program on Sleep, Circadian Biology and Neurodegeneration. His clinical activities include the diagnosis and treatment of a wide spectrum of movement disorders and co-existent sleep dysfunction associated with these disorders. His research is focused on the interface of sleep, circadian biology and neurodegeneration, and clinical trials in sleep and neurodegenerative disorders, with an emphasis on Parkinson’s disease. Dr. Videnovic directs a clinical and research program on REM Sleep Behavior Disorder at MGH.