Objective: This study compares PD patients with healthy control subjects in terms of being given birth as the first child.

Background: It is known that newborn infants from a primipara women are more vulnerable to hypoxia and asphyxia due to prolonged labor . It is unclear whether or not this situation affects the risk of developing Parkinson’s disease (PD) To the best of our knowledge this is the first study which compares PD patients with healthy control subjects in terms of being given birth as the first child.

Method: We included 61 patients diagnosed with PD as well as 50 healthy age and gender-matched volunteers. Participants were questioned in terms of perinatal history; those who were born from their mother’s first pregnancy and who did not have a dead or living biological sibling born before them were defined as “first-born”. Age, gender, disease stage (Hoehn and Yahr), and maternal and paternal age at birth of the participants were recorded.

Results: There were 61 (27 females (..%), average age ) PD patients and 50 (23 females %, average age) healthy controls. There was no statistically significant difference between the groups in terms of age, gender distribution, and rate of being the first-born and mean maternal and paternal ages at birth (p=0.477, p=0.992, p=0.645, respectively). Data on maternal and paternal age of 52 PD patients and 42 control subjects was available. No significant difference was determined between the groups according to rate of maternal age younger and older than the age of 30 at birth (p=0.815).

Conclusion: It is known that firstborn infants are more subjected to birth asphyxia due to prolonged labor, according to our study, there was no difference in rate of being the firstborn between PD patients and the control group.
Gardener et al. investigated perinatal risk factors including season of birth, birth weight, paternal age, preterm birth, multiple birth, and presence of breastfeeding were compared between PD and non-PD groups, and found that the likelihood of PD increased only in participants with maternal age of 30 years or older at birth . The study did not examine birth order as a potential risk factor for PD.
In conclusion our study points out that being born as the first child does not increase the risk of PD.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/evaluation-of-birth-order-in-parkinsons-disease/