Systematic review of levodopa dose equivalency reporting in Parkinson's disease.

Category Systematic review
JournalMovement disorders : official journal of the Movement Disorder Society
Year 2010
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Interpretation of clinical trials comparing different drug regimens for Parkinson's disease (PD) is complicated by the different dose intensities used: higher doses of levodopa and, possibly, other drugs produce better symptomatic control but more late complications. To address this problem, conversion factors have been calculated for antiparkinsonian drugs that yield a total daily levodopa equivalent dose (LED). LED estimates vary, so we undertook a systematic review of studies reporting LEDs to provide standardized formulae. Electronic database and hand searching of references identified 56 primary reports of LED estimates. Data were extracted and the mean and modal LEDs calculated. This yielded a standardized LED for each drug, providing a useful tool to express dose intensity of different antiparkinsonian drug regimens on a single scale. Using these conversion formulae to report LEDs would improve the consistency of reporting and assist the interpretation of clinical trials comparing different PD medications.
Epistemonikos ID: 2147b2ac620d0a32b6cfbb7034c0505609a92a87
First added on: Aug 03, 2014