title: Perceived imbalance and risk of Parkinson's disease.
abstract: We prospectively examined associations between perceived imbalance and Parkinson's disease (PD) risk in the Health Professional Follow-up Study (HPFS), and Nurses' Health Study (NHS). We included 39,087 men and 82,299 women free of PD at baseline (1990) in the current analyses. We documented 449 incident PD cases during 12 years follow-up. Subjects who reported difficulty with balance before 1990 (baseline) were 1.8 more times likely to develop PD, relative to those who reported no balance difficulty (pooled multivariate RR = 1.8; 95% CI: 1.3, 2.5; P < 0.0001). When we further examined associations between perceived imbalance at baseline and PD onset during different time periods, we found a significant elevation of PD risk only during the first 4 years of follow-up. This result suggests that the imbalance may in some cases be an early sign of PD, and may represent the onset of motor symptoms although they have not been clinically recognized.
authors.affiliation: Department of Nutrition, Harvard University School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA. xgao@hsph.harvard.edu
authors.forename: Xiang
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.forename: Honglei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Michael A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Schwarzschild
authors.forename: Giancarlo
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Logroscino
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ascherio
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001294:Attitude to Health; D001364:Awareness; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004856:Postural Balance / Q000502:physiology*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires