Exposure to well water and pesticides in Parkinson's disease: A case‐control study in the madrid area

Abstract

Past exposure to well water and pesticides was assessed in 128 unselected Parkinson's disease (PD) patients and 256 age and sex-matched controls. All were residents in a defined urban area of Madrid, Spain. In keeping with other reports, we found that exposure to well water might be a factor associated with the likelihood of developing PD, though only prolonged exposures of 30 years or longer were significantly different between PD and controls (p less than 0.02). In contrast, past exposure to pesticides did not appear to be associated with an increased risk of developing PD. Prolonged well water drinking antedating the development of PD was not associated with early onset of the disease, nor did such cases progress to greater disability. Future case-control studies addressing prolonged well water consumption as a risk factor in PD should look for differences in the content of substances other than pesticides in the water as determined by the source of water to which patients may have been specifically exposed.

The Epidemiology of Parkinson’s Disease in an Australian Population

“…Drinking water from a private well has been implicated in the development of PD in some studies [11,13,21]. We did not observe any statistical increase in the risk of PD associated with ingesting well, bore or spring water.…”

Superoxide Dismutase/Catalase Mimetics Are Neuroprotective against Selective Paraquat-mediated Dopaminergic Neuron Death in the Substantial Nigra

“…Some epidemiological investigations have suggested that increased exposure to agricultural chemicals via living in a rural environment, drinking well water, or occupational exposure may be a potential environmental risk factor for the disease (3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9). The widely used herbicide paraquat has been demonstrated to selectively damage the nigrostriatal dopaminergic system (11) and exposure to this specific agricultural chemical has been postulated to be a prime risk factor for PD (3,7).…”

“…Epidemiological studies have suggested that exposure to agricultural chemicals is associated with an increased risk of developing PD (3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9). The herbicide 1,1Ј-dimethyl-4,4Ј-bipyridium (paraquat, PQ) may contribute to the pathogenesis of PD based on both epidemiological studies of parkinsonism correlated with exposure to the agent (3,7), and its structural similarity to the active metabolite of the parkinsonism-inducing agent 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine, 1-methyl-4-phenylpyridium ion.…”

Epidemiology and etiology of Parkinson’s disease: a review of the evidence

“…One study reported an OR of 7.0 (p value <0.05) [289] and another an OR of 10.9 (95% CI 2.5-48.0) [301]. The remaining 19 case-control studies that analyzed results from pesticide exposure overall reported no association [131,136,137,141,142,144,145,[305][306][307][308][309][310][311][312][313][314][315][316][317].…”