Objective: This study examined the effect of nonmotor symptoms on the quality of life (QoL) of Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients.

Background: Parkinson’s disease has a very broad clinical spectrum, ranging from classic motor symptoms to heterogeneous nonmotor symptoms. Motor symptoms inhibits daily activities and their effects on the patients’ QoL are very noticeable. On the other hand, nonmotor symptoms often receive less attention and how they affect the QoL of PD patients has not been widely studied.

Method: This observational study with cross-sectional design was conducted in outpatient clinic at three hospitals in Palembang city, South Sumatera, Indonesia.  Patients diagnosed with PD based on the criteria of the United Kingdom Parkinson’s Disease Society Bank and agreed to follow the study were included as subjects, while patients with language disorders were excluded from the study. Patients were then interviewed about the study variables, including the Non Motor Symptom Questionnaire (NMSQ) and Parkinson’s Disease Questionnaire-39 (PDQ-39) with a cut-off value of 34.4. The data was analyzed with Chi-square or Fisher’s exact tests and logistic regression.

Results: Of the 52 subjects, most were >60 years old (69.2%) and male (55.8%). The majority of patients were at stage 3 (59.6%) by Hoehn and Yahr stadium and had suffered from PD for ≥5 years (63.5%). Neuropsychiatric symptoms are experienced by all patients. Autonomic symptoms were the second most common nonmotor symptoms (94.2%), followed by gastrointestinal symptoms and sleep disorders (88.5% each), while sensory symptoms and other symptoms were experienced by only 25% and 23.1% of subjects.  PD patients with a good QoL (59.6%) out of those with poor QoL (40.4%). Bivariate analysis showed that the stage of the disease, the duration of the disease and sensory symptoms significantly affected the patient’s QoL (p values 0.009; 0.006; 0.014; respectively) [table 1]. However, in multivariate analysis only stages (OR 3,186, CI 95% 1,127-9,007) and sensory disorders (OR 3,771, CI 95% 0,898-15,837) that affect the quality of life of PD patients (p=0.029 and 0.070) [table 2].

Conclusion: Although they do not pose any direct physical barriers, nonmotor symptoms still play a role in determining the QoL of PD patients. Given that nonmotor symptoms in PD vary widely, even less common symptoms still have the potential to decrease patients’ QoL.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/impact-of-nonmotor-symptoms-on-the-quality-of-life-of-parkinsons-disease-patients/