Treatment of Huntington disease with a cholinergic agonist.

The involuntary movements of Huntington disease may be related to cholinergic hypofunction in the striatum. For this reason, the effect of a direct cholinergic agonist, arecoline, was studied in six patients with this disorder. Rather than improving the chorea, arecoline tended to exacerbate the choreic movements. Arecoline did produce significant alterations of blood pressure, heart rate, and body temperature, probably by central cholinergic stimulation.