Nonmotor Symptoms Feed Fear of Falling in Patients With Parkinson Disease

In patients with Parkinson disease, nonmotor symptom burden significantly affects fear of falling and participation in activities of daily living, according to study results published online ahead of print in the Journal of Neuroscience Nursing.

“Nurses should approach patients with Parkinson disease with a focus not only on assessing motor symptoms but also on assessing nonmotor symptoms,” wrote corresponding author Feride Taskin Yilmaz, PhD, RN, of the Sakarya University of Applied Sciences in Turkey and coauthors.

The correlational study included 309 patients with Parkinson disease. To investigate the relationship between nonmotor symptom burden and activities of daily living and fear of falling, researchers collected patient information using the Non-Motor Symptoms Scale, the Katz Activities of Daily Living Scale, and the Fear of Falling Questionnaire.

A third of patients expressed a fear of falling, according to the study. Overall, 70.2% of patients had nonmotor symptom severity levels considered very high, and 33.7% were semidependent or dependent in activities of daily living.

Non-Motor Symptoms Scale scores were inversely related to scores on the Katz Activities of Daily Living Scale and Fear of Falling Questionnaire, the study showed.

“Nonmotor symptom burden independently explained 66% of the total variance in the performance of activities of daily living and 69% of the total variance in fear of falling,” researchers reported.

Reference: 
Taskin Yilmaz F, Celik S, Anataca G, Mercan Sakar E. Associations of nonmotor symptom burden, activities of daily living, and fear of falling in Parkinson disease. J Neurosci Nurs. Published online June 20, 2023. doi:10.1097/JNN.0000000000000712