Objective: The purpose of this study was to evaluate vitamin D levels in a population at risk for developing Parkinson’s disease (PD).

Background: Vitamin D deficiency is common in PD, especially in advanced disease, and has been implicated as a potential risk factor for the development of PD. Within the PD population, lower levels of vitamin D have been linked to relative impairment in balance, motor function, mood and cognition. Findings from epidemiologic studies, however, have been inconsistent, with the most recent Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) study finding no association between baseline vitamin D levels and risk of PD 17 years later. No study has explored vitamin D levels in subjects with pre-diagnostic PD on the cusp of diagnosis.

Methods: The Parkinson’s Associated Risk Study (PARS) is a well-characterized cohort of participants at risk for developing PD. Serum vitamin D levels were measured from samples collected at baseline using the gold standard liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry. We examined correlations between vitamin D levels and (1) dopaminergic system integrity (putaminal dopamine transporter (DAT) uptake), as well as (2) cognitive performance in the PARS cohort. 

Results: PARS study individuals with serum samples available for analysis (n=198) comprised a group at high risk for PD based on hyposmia and DAT putaminal uptake <80% of age-expected (n=56) vs. all others (n=142).  Mean vitamin D levels did not differ between the two groups, with a level of 27.8ng/ml [SD=12.0] in the high-risk group vs. 24.7ng/mL [SD=9.0] in all others (p=0.09).  The high risk group demonstrated poorer performance on executive domain cognitive testing (p=0.02), but there were no other significant differences in cognition. Using partial correlations, there was no association between vitamin D level and putaminal DAT uptake, controlling for age, sex and season of blood draw. Additionally, there were no correlations between vitamin D levels and cognitive performance.

Conclusions: Vitamin D levels did not differ between PARS participants at high risk for Parkinson’s disease compared to controls, and vitamin D level was not associated with cognitive function or with dopaminergic system integrity.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/vitamin-d-in-the-parkinsons-associated-risk-pars-study/