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REVIEW ARTICLE

Updates on the sleep benefit phenomenon in Parkinson’s disease: A narrative review

Yin-Lian Han1 ,  Jia-Yi Jin1 ,  Man-Ling Lang1 ,  Zi-Han Cui1 ,  Jia-Hui Yan1 ,  Han-Xing Li1 ,  Chun-Feng Liu1,2* ,  Yun Shen1*
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1 Department of Neurology and Clinical Research Center of Neurological Disease, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Suzhou, Jiangsu, China
2 Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Neuropsychiatric Diseases and Institute of Neuroscience, Soochow University, Suzhou, Jiangsu, China
Advanced Neurology, 025180047 https://doi.org/10.36922/AN025180047
Received: 4 May 2025 | Revised: 26 August 2025 | Accepted: 12 September 2025 | Published online: 30 September 2025
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advanced Neurology 3rd Anniversary Special Issue)
© 2025 by the Author(s). This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ )
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Abstract

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder globally, characterized by progressive motor and non-motor dysfunction due to multisystemic pathology. Although present pharmacological treatments offer symptomatic relief, they are often associated with adverse effects and do not halt disease progression, highlighting the need for complementary therapeutic strategies. An intriguing phenomenon termed “sleep benefit” has been reported in some PD patients, characterized by temporary improvements in motor and non-motor symptoms following sleep, either nocturnal or daytime naps. Sleep benefit may offer a lower risk profile compared to traditional pharmacotherapy; however, its underlying mechanisms and clinical significance remain poorly understood. In this review, we synthesize the existing literature on sleep benefit in PD, summarizing its clinical characteristics, prevalence, and associated factors. We also discuss distinctions between subjective and objective assessments and explore potential pathophysiological mechanisms underlying this phenomenon, aiming to provide new insights into non-pharmacological approaches for PD management.

Keywords
Parkinson’s disease
Sleep benefit
Dopaminergic drugs
Motor symptoms
Potential mechanisms
Sleep disorder
Funding
This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2022YFC2503904), Jiangsu Provincial Medical Key Discipline (ZDXK202217), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (82401741, 82471269), Science and Technology Innovation Project of Xiongan New Area (2023XAGG0073), and the Suzhou Key Laboratory (SZS2023015).
Conflict of interest
Chun-Feng Liu serves as an Associate Editor for this journal, but was not in any way involved in the editorial and peer-review process conducted for this paper, directly or indirectly. Separately, other authors declared that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have influenced the work reported in this paper.
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Advanced Neurology, Electronic ISSN: 2810-9619 Print ISSN: 3060-8589, Published by AccScience Publishing
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