Parkinson's disease and carotid intima-media thickness.

UNLABELLED Reports about the impact of cerebrovascular disease (CVD) on clinical status in Parkinson's disease (PD) are rather controversial. There have been a few studies and inconsistent results regarding the coincidence of Parkinson's disease (PD) and atherosclerotic diseases, such as cerebrovascular disease. Carotid intima-media thickness (IMT) is a known marker for subclinical atherosclerosis. AIM This study was done to investigate the carotid IMT between PD patients and controls. MATERIAL AND METHODS A total of 54 PD patients and 50 controls were examined. The duration of Parkinson's disease, the severity of Parkinson's disease (the Hoehn-Yahr stage) and carotid IMT were examined. RESULTS The mean Hoehn and Yahr stage was 2.78 (range 2-4). Duration of disease had a mean of 7.59 +/- 0.85 years. The left CCA mean IMT was 0.900 +/- 0.147 in Parkinson group and 0.828 +/- 0.118 in control group (p = 0.007). The right CCA mean IMT was 0.891 +/- 0.176 mm in the Parkinson group and 0.860 +/- 0.164 in control group (p = 0.360). No relationship between the Hoehn and Yahr stages or the duration of PD with the IMT were found by the Pearson's correlation test. CONCLUSIONS The carotid IMT was higher in PD patients than in controls.