Objective: To evaluate the knowledge, attitudes towards disease, and to assess the effect of beliefs on decision making among  patients with PD, and their first-degree relatives.

Background: Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a chronic, neurodegenerative disease characterized with cardinal motor, non-motor symptoms. It is a disabling disease with motor, non-motor fluctuations,dyskinesia that emerge as disease progresses. PD has a negative impact on the quality of life of patients, leading to stigma, social isolation, being dependent. To improve quality of life of patients, it is important to understand the disease perception of patients that may vary in different cultures due to their beliefs, traditions.

Method: Twenty idiopathic PD patients, their relatives that provided written informed consent was enrolled the study. Socio-demographic data, disease characteristics were recorded via face-to- face interviews. All patients completed the Illness Perception Questionnaire, Parkinson’s Disease Quality of Life (PDQOL) questionnaire. Data were organized in SPSS Version 23 database. Descriptive statistics, χ2 test, Student-t test, Man-Whitney U test, correlation, regression analysis. P values<0.05 were considered as statistical significance.

Results: There were no statistically significant ethnicity difference between the groups, All participants were muslim, religion was “always important” in decision making in both pwPD,and relatives group.There were statistically significant negative correlations between the duration of disease and the social domain score of PDOQL, and H&Y score. All patients were aware that they had serious disease, 70% stated that their illness strongly affects the way others see them.95% of pwPD blamed their own behaviours, attitudes, family problems as the cause. All patients listed the cause of their having PD as providence of god, jinni, evil eye, destiny, and divine punishment.

Conclusion: Disease perception, knowledge and attitudes of pwPW towards the disease are highly effected by the beliefs, cultural and traditional features. To establish a global perspective by filling the gaps in the knowledge about PD, and to avoid misperceptions by enhancing public understanding, multidisciplinary approach and further, large scale comparative studies with patients from different cultures, ethnic groups, races and beliefs should be performed.

References: 1. Mokaya J, Gray WK, Carr J. Beliefs, knowledge and attitudes towards Parkinson’ s disease among a Xhosa speaking black population in South Africa: A cross-sectionalstudy. Parkinsonism and Related Disorders 2017;41.51-57. 2. Pan S, Stutzbach J, Reichwein S, Lee BK, Dahodwala N. Knowledge and attitudes about Parkinson’s disease among a diverse group of older adults. J Cross Cult Gerontol. 2014 Sep;29(3):339-52.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/beliefs-knowledge-and-attitudes-towards-parkinsons-disease-turkey-experience-from-a-global-perspective/