Common medications may delay Parkinson’s disease onset: Study
Blood pressure, cholesterol meds linked to later onset, researchers say
Medications commonly used to treat conditions such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and pain may delay Parkinson’s disease onset, according to a U.S. study.
Analyses found that anti-hypertensives such as adrenergic blockers, cholesterol-lowering statins, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) were strongly associated with later onset disease. In contrast, a recent history of smoking was linked to an earlier onset.
“The medications we studied have common features that may explain their effect on Parkinson’s disease, including the ability to control inflammation,” senior author Michele Tagliati, MD, vice chair of Cedars-Sinai’s neurology department and director of the movement disorders division, said in a Cedars-Sinai news story.
The study, “Adrenergic blockers, statins, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs in Parkinson’s disease progression: a retrospective cohort study,” was published in the Journal of Neurology.“
Parkinson’s disease is a progressive neurological disorder characterized by motor and nonmotor symptoms. While the exact causes of Parkinson’s are not completely understood, identified risk factors include brain injury and exposure to environmental toxins, chemicals, or metals, as well as genetic predisposition and aging.
Research has suggested NSAIDs such as aspirin and ibuprofen, along with other commonly used medicines, may lower the risk of developing Parkinson’s, but their role in delaying symptom onset has been less studied.
Preventing disability
“Given the current lack of disease-modifying therapies for [Parkinson’s], any medication that may delay the onset of [Parkinson’s], and therefore prevent years of disability, should be further studied,” the researchers wrote.
The team looked at the medical records of 1,201 Parkinson’s patients examined at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center from 2010 to 2021 to determine how certain medications, smoking, and family history of Parkinson’s influenced the age at disease onset — that is, the age at which a person first experiences symptoms of Parkinson’s.
The study population was primarily male (63.5%) with a mean age at disease onset of 63.7. Many patients had co-existing conditions such as high blood pressure (41.7%) and high cholesterol (33.8%).
Analysis revealed a significant association between the use of certain medications — such as anti-hypertensives, statins, NSAIDS, diuretics, and anti-diabetic drugs — and later onset of Parkinson’s symptoms.
Patients who had used adrenergic blockers, statins, and NSAIDs before developing Parkinson’s experienced symptoms years later than those who had never taken these medications. On average, adrenergic blockers delayed symptoms by 9.6 years, statins by 9.3 years, and NSAIDs by 8.6 years.
When statins or NSAIDs were used after Parkinson’s symptoms had begun, patients still experienced a significant delay in disease onset compared with those who had never taken them, although to a lesser degree than when the medications were taken before symptom onset. Statins resulted in a delay of 3.8 years, while NSAIDs delayed onset by 2.7 years.
A history of smoking in the past decade and a family history of Parkinson’s were both associated with a younger age at disease onset.
Among all factors analyzed, adrenergic blockers, statins, and NSAIDs remained the “strongest independent predictors” of a delayed disease onset, suggesting that being treated with these medications could delay Parkinson’s onset, the researchers wrote. Conversely, smoking history was the strongest predictor of an earlier onset.
The researchers suggested that statins and NSAIDs may protect against Parkinson’s by directly reducing brain inflammation, a common feature of Parkinson’s and other neurological disorders. Statins may also help by reducing oxidative stress, a type of cellular damage, and by preventing the buildup of alpha-synuclein, a protein that accumulates to toxic levels in the brains of people with Parkinson’s and is one of the key hallmarks of the disease.
Adrenergic blockers might exert their protective effect by controlling hypertension, a potential risk factor for Parkinson’s, and by reducing brain inflammation through the suppression of an overactive sympathetic nervous system, which regulates involuntary functions like heart rate and blood pressure. According to the authors, sympathetic hyperactivity is tightly linked to neuroinflammation, and both statins and NSAIDs have been shown to suppress sympathetic nervous system activity, providing an additional pathway by which they may they reduce inflammation.
“While additional studies are needed to monitor patients over time, this research suggests that the medications studied also help control the cellular stress response and brain inflammation, which may have a prominent role in delaying the development of Parkinson’s disease,” Tagliati said.
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