The characteristics of gastrointestinal symptoms in patients of Parkinson′s disease / 中华神经科杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To investigate the characteristics of gastrointestinal (GI) symptom spectrum in patients with Parkinson′s disease (PD), and to help the early identification of gastrointestinal symptoms and management of PD.Methods:One hundred PD patients in the Department of Neurology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital from January 2017 to August 2017 were enrolled in this study. They were assessed by face-to-face GI dysfunction questionnaire, including eight common symptoms involved in oropharynx, upper and lower digestive tract. The Spearman correlation analysis was performed.Results:The age of PD patients was (61.9±10.5) years, the ratio of male to female was 53∶47 and the disease duration was 4.0 (2.0, 6.0) years. There were 42 cases of Hoehn-Yahr (H-Y) stage 1, 30 cases of H-Y stage 2 and 28 cases of H-Y stage 3 and above (24 cases of H-Y stage 3, three cases of H-Y stage 4 and one case of H-Y stage 5). Totally 58% (58/100) of PD patients had one or more GI symptoms. Constipation (42%, 42/100), dysdefecation (38%, 38/100) and salivation (28%, 28/100) were the top three of most common GI symptoms. Lower GI symptoms were the most common (57%, 57/100), followed by oropharyngeal symptoms (33%, 33/100), and upper GI symptoms (27%, 27/100). GI symptoms could appear in H-Y stage 1 patients, 26.1% (11/42) of which had 1-2 kinds of GI symptoms and over 20% of which had more than three kinds of GI symptoms. A total of 39.3% (11/28) of PD patients with H-Y stage ≥3 had more than three kinds of GI symptoms. The Gastroparesis Cardinal Symptom Index (GCSI) score in patients with upper GI symptoms was 3.0 (2.0,6.5). The constipation symptom score in patients with constipation and dysdefecation was 19.0 (12.0,27.3). As for the clinical type of constipation, 66.7% (38/57) of them were mixed, 21.0% (12/57) were slow transit and 12.3% (7/57) were dysdefecation. In 38.6% (22/57) of the constipated patients, constipation symptoms occurred earlier than PD motor symptoms. Correlation analysis showed that H-Y stage was positively correlated with the course of PD, the number of GI symptoms, salivation, constipation, dysdefecation and constipation symptom scores.Conclusions:Constipation, dysdefecation and salivation were the most common GI symptoms in PD patients. PD patients had at least one GI symptom in the early stage (H-Y stage 1). Lower GI symptoms were more common than oropharyngeal symptoms and upper GI symptoms. With the development of PD, the number of GI symptoms, salivation, constipation and dysdefecation were aggravated, which were important for early symptomatic identification and disease management.