Abstract
Narcolepsy is clinically characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) and other symptoms including cataplexy, sleep paralysis, hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations, automatic behaviors, disrupted nocturnal sleep, REM sleep behavior disorder, and moderate weight gain [1–5]. Vehicle accidents and social, familial, professional, and psychological problems are common and can dramatically impact quality of life. More than 95% of the cases are sporadic but the disease has been described in some families and in monozygotic twins. The risk of a first-degree relative developing narcolepsy with cataplexy (NC) is 10–40 times higher (1–2%) than that in the general population. The cause of NC is still unknown, although an autoimmune process occurring in the brain is suspected since the condition is linked to a loss of hypocretin- (orexin-) producing cells in the hypothalamus, low levels of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) hypocretin [6–13], and the presence of the human leukocyte antigen (HLA) DQB1*0602 subtype [14].
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