Smoking is associated with age at disease onset in Parkinson's disease. (April 2022) - Rosas, Irene
Abstract: Background: Previous studies linked disease-progression variables such as age at onset or survival to both genetic, and non-genetic factors in Parkinson's disease (PD) patients. Objective: The aim of this study was to assess how genetic and non genetic factors act as modifiers of age at onset and survival and in a cohort of 753 PD patients, and to determine how these variables interact to define the overall risk. Methods: We analyzed the effect of gender, tobacco, alcohol, type of PD (genetic, gPD or idiopathic, iPD) and three genetic variants rs5848- GRN, rs1042522- TP53 and APOE . We studied two cohorts (PPMI and IPDGC) to replicate positive results. Results: Regarding age at onset, male smokers PD had a significantly lower mean age compared to non-smoker (p = 0.001). A POE -Ɛ4 carriers had a younger onset-age compared to non-carriers (p = 0.03) in the Spanish cohort, but these results were not replicated in the other cohorts. Concerning survival, PD patients with an early onset (below 50 years) had an increased survival rate (p < 0.001). Conclusions: Our study showed how several genetic and non-genetic risk factors influenced the age at onset and survival in PD. Highlights: Smoking is associated with a lower mean age at PD onset. In the overall PD cohort, APOE genotype was not associated with age at PD onset. PD patients with an early onset (below 50 years) had an increased survival rate.