Systemic Oxidative Stress in Patients with Neurodegenerative Diseases

Oxidative stress and oxidative damage have been recognized in the brain of patients with neurodegenerative diseases since the early stages of the diseases. Oxidative stress and damage have been reported in patients of Alzheimer disease, Parkinson disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and vascular dementia. Products of free-radical reactions in the brain, such as lipid peroxidation products and carbonyl groups in small peptides, were determined in blood, plasma, serum and cerebrospinal fluid of patients with the mentioned diseases. There is a clear evidence of a link between brain oxidative stress and damage and circulating indicators of such damage. Body fluids from living patients represent the best source of information about brain metabolism in neurodegenerative diseases. Cerebrospinal fluid provides a unique window of brain status for neuronal cell and brain tissue alterations. The ideal biomarker of brain oxidative stress should be determined in blood or plasma that are easy to collect.