Anxiety is associated with cognitive impairment in newly-diagnosed Parkinson's disease

Introduction Anxiety and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) are prevalent non-motor manifestations of Parkinson's disease (PD). While few studies have demonstrated a possible link between cognitive dysfunction and anxiety in PD, to our knowledge, no studies have directly examined the association between them. This study investigated the association between anxiety and cognitive deficits in newly diagnosed PD patients. Methods Patients with newly diagnosed PD (N\ua0=\ua0185) were recruited from community and outpatient clinics. Anxiety was assessed using the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (MDS-UPDRS) clinician rated anxiety item, which has previously been validated against a standardized criteria for the diagnosis of anxiety disorders in PD. Participants scoring ≥2 were classified as anxious. A threshold of 1 SD below normative values (obtained from controls) was used to define cognitive impairment. Impairments in specific cognitive domains were identified as being >1 SD below controls in ≥1 test per domain. Results After controlling for age, education and motor severity, patients with anxiety were three times more likely to have cognitive impairment compared to those without anxiety (OR\ua0=\ua03.0, 95% CI\ua0=\ua01.2–7.3, p\ua