Gender differences in motor and non-motor symptoms in individuals with mild-moderate Parkinson’s disease

Abstract

Background Parkinson’s disease (PD) affects both men and women with documented gender differences across functional domains, with findings varying among reports. Knowledge regarding gender differences in PD for different geographic locations is important for further understanding of the disease and for developing personalized gender-specific PD assessment tools and therapies. Objective This study aimed to examine gender differences in PD-related motor, motor-cognitive, cognitive, and psychosocial function in people with PD from the southern United States (US). Methods 199 (127 men and 72 women; M age: 69.08±8.94) individuals with mild-moderate idiopathic PD (Hoehn &Yahr (H&Y) Median = 2, stages I-III) from a large metro area in the southeastern US were included in this retrospective, cross-sectional study. Motor, motor-cognitive, cognitive, and psychosocial data were obtained using standardized and validated clinical tests. Univariate analyses were performed, adjusting for age and housing type. Results After adjustment for age, housing, PD duration and fall rate, men exhibited statistically significantly greater motor (Movement Disorders Society (MDS)-Unified Parkinson Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS)-II) and non-motor (MDS-UPDRS-I) impact of PD, and more severe motor signs (MDS-UPDRS-III). Men exhibited worse PD-specific health-related quality of life related to mobility, activities of daily living, emotional well-being, cognitive impairment, communication, and more depressive symptoms. Men performed worse on a subtraction working memory task. Women had slower fast gait speed. Conclusions In the southeastern United States, men may experience worse PD-related quality of life and more depression than women. Many non-motor and motor variables that are not PD specific show no differences between genders in this cohort. These findings can contribute to the development of gender-sensitive assessment and rehabilitation policies and protocols for people with PD.

Phantosmia in Parkinson’s Disease: A Systematic Review of the Phenomenology of Olfactory Hallucinations

“…Noteworthy, the study by Solla and colleagues showed that female sex was a clinical variable predicting the presence of OHs in PD patients [40]. These data reinforced the putative central role of sex differences in the development of NMSs in PD patients, with particular references to olfactory symptoms [55][56][57]. Future research on phantosmia should explore the potential influence of sex on the development of OHs in PD patients.…”

Non-motor symptoms associated with progressive loss of dopaminergic neurons in a mouse model of Parkinson’s disease

“…Nevertheless, no significant effect of sex on PD-like phenotypes in mice contrasts with some other observations from studies on male and female PD patients cohorts ( Picillo et al, 2016 ; Perrin et al, 2017 ; Li et al, 2023 ). Some reports indicate that male PD patients experience greater decline of motor and non-motor function, though no sex-dependent differences in progression rate were found ( Abraham et al, 2019 , 2023 ; Picillo et al, 2022 ; Li et al, 2023 ).…”

Sex-specific progression of Parkinson’s disease: A longitudinal mixed-models analysis

“…Marginal effects of disease duration on the outcomes (i.e., disease duration averaged over random-effects) of the outcomes were estimated with the function "ggpredict" of the R package ggeffects 27 to describe the progression in both groups, illustrated as a plot with the function "plot_model" of the R package sjPlot 28 . As women's ratings of disability differed between self-reported and physician-reported 29 , we categorised the results in patient-reported or clinician-assessed outcomes / performance tests. Time, in this case modelled as disease duration, was included in the mixed models to describe progression of the different outcomes (significance tested via t-test).…”