ABSTRACT
Insomnia is the most common sleep complaint. Insomnia is not a disease itself but
mostly a clinical sign of an underlying disease. Degenerative and vascular diseases
involving the central nervous system (CNS) may impair sleep either as a result of
the brain lesion or because of illness-related discomfort (motor immobility, social
and familial impairment, depression, drugs). Some neurological conditions characterized
by movement disorders that start or persist during sleep hinder sleep onset and/or
sleep continuity, causing a poor sleep complaint. CNS lesions and/or dysfunction in
three specific neurological conditions (fatal familial insomnia, Morvan's chorea,
and delirium tremens) impair the basic mechanisms of sleep generation inducing a syndrome
in which the inability to sleep is consistently associated with motor and sympathergic
overactivation. Agrypnia excitata is the term that aptly defines this generalized
overactivation syndrome.
KEYWORDS
Insomnia - fatal familial insomnia - agrypnia excitata - movement disorders - degenerative
diseases
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Elio LugaresiM.D.
Department of Neurological Sciences, University of Bologna
Via Ugo Foscolo, 7, 40123 Bologna, Italy
