Survival in Patients with Parkinson’s Disease: a Ten-Year Follow-Up Study in Northern China

Abstract Background A thorough understanding of the factors that influence patient survival in Parkinson’s disease (PD) will aid in prognosis prediction and provide a new direction for disease modification treatment. Currently, there are no standardized mortality ratio (SMR) data for PD patients in the northern Chinese mainland. The main focus of this study was to determine which factors in the prospectively collected baseline characteristics can affect the survival of PD patients. In addition, for the first time, we investigated the SMR of PD patients in northern China. Methods Between 2009 and 2012, 218 PD patients were continuously recruited from the movement disorder clinic of the First Affiliated Hospital of Dalian Medical University and followed up until death or May 31, 2021. The prespecified prognostic variables were demographics, clinical features, lifestyle factors, and drug dose prospectively collected at baseline. To determine the independent predictors of survival during follow-up, the Cox proportional hazards model was used. Kaplan–Meier analysis was applied to estimate the overall survival curve and to compare survival between layers based on statistically significant predictors. The SMR of this northern Chinese mainland PD cohort was calculated. Results After a mean follow-up of 9.58 ± 2.27 years, 50 patients (22.90%) died. Factors that could individually predict shortened survival during follow-up included older age at onset (hazard ratio [HR] 1.10, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.06–1.15), Hoehn and Yahr (H&Y) stage ≥ 3 (HR 9.36, 95% CI 2.82–31.03) and severe cognitive impairment (HR 6.18, 95% CI 2.75–13.88). Univariate Cox regression revealed that a certain amount of physical activity was associated with better survival (HR 0.41, 95% CI 0.22–0.74), while fatigue was associated with an increased risk of death (HR 2.54, 95% CI 1.37–4.70). The overall SMR was 1.32 (95% CI 0.98–1.74). Conclusions Older age at onset, higher baseline H&Y stage, and severe cognitive impairment have a negative impact on survival. The 10-year survival of PD patients is not significantly different from that of the general population in China.