Sleep in ambulatory patients with stable cirrhosis of the liver

This was the first polysomnographic study of patients with stable cirrhosis demonstrating severely disturbed sleep infrastructure and presence of excessive PLMS with arousals. The pathobiochemical mechanisms of these findings remain to be established. Independent of the mechanisms, these polysomnographic findings confirmed the subjective reports of poor sleep by patients with cirrhosis. Further, a subset of patients with cirrhosis acquired a syndrome similar to idiopathic Parkinson's disease, which per se was frequently associated with PLMS; the current results were consistent with this notion. Future studies are needed to determine if PLMS of cirrhosis is an early indication of incident Parkinsonian syndrome.