ORIGINAL CONTRIBUTION History of Vascular Disease and Mild Parkinsonian Signs in Community-Dwelling Elderly Individuals

Background: Mild parkinsonian signs (MPS) are com-monly found during the clinical examination of older people. These signs could reflect the accumulation of vas-cular pathological changes in the brain. If the etiology were vascular, one could hypothesize that individualswith MPS would bemore likely to have systemic vascular dis-ease than would their counterparts without these signs. Objectives:To examinewhetherMPS are associatedwith a history of vascular disease andwhether certainMPS (ri-gidity, changes in axial function) are more strongly as-sociated with a history of vascular disease than are other MPS (tremor). Methods: Evaluation of older people without demen-tia in Washington Heights-Inwood, northern Manhat-tan, NY. The presence of vascular diseases was assesse