Objective: The aim of this study was to identify predictive risk factors for falls in patients with PB.

Background: Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a chronic, slowly progressive neurodegenerative disease that leads to gait and balance disturbances over time. During walking, sudden “freezing” occurs (the patient stops and cannot continue walking). When freezing occurs, the feet are behind the body’s center of gravity, which in turn contributes to the patient taking a series of short, quick steps that can lead to a fall (5).

Method: The prospective study included patients with PD who underwent neurological rehabilitation at the Institute of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine University Medical Center Maribor.
We analyzed the demographic characteristics of the patients (age, sex, disease duration, and history of falls). To assess cognitive function, we used the Mini Mental State Examination (KPSS) test. Patients were assessed with the following tests: Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS III), with Hoehn and the Yahr scale, the Timed Up and Go Test (TUG), the Berg Balance Scale (BBS) and the Walking Freeze Questionnaire, where we used the sum of the third to sixth Freezing of gait questionary (FOG -Q). We were also interested in the use of medical devices while walking. Data were statistically analyzed using SPSS 20.0 for Windows.

Results: 45 patients with PB participated in the study. It was found that 30 out of 45 patients (66.6%) fell during treatment and 15 patients (33.3%) did not fall during treatment. .
Patients who fell during treatment had a statistically significant longer duration of illness.There were no significant differences in age, male gender, and medical device use between patients who fell at the time of treatment and patients who did not fall.
The mean UPDRS-III score was 19.7 points in patients who fell during treatment and 14.7 points compared with patients who did not fall. The difference is statistically significant. There were also statistically significant differences in performance on all other tests (KPSS, TUG, BBS, FOG) (p < 0.001).

Conclusion: Falls in patients with PB are a common problem. Duration of disease, higher estimation of disease severity or advanced disease, presence of freezing during walking and patients with more severe decline in cognitive abilities have a higher risk of falls. We believe that we need to identify the cause of falls and possible risk factors in patients who fall

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