Study Confirms Link Between Low Cholesterol and Parkinson's Disease

An international team of neurologists and cardiovascular researchers has released data showing that reduced levels of LDL-cholesterol, which are good from the point of view of the cardiologist, actually increase the risk of developing Parkinson's disease.

The data linking LDL-cholesterol to Parkinson's disease was obtained from the 1991 to 1993 Honolulu-Asia Aging Study in which the lipid profiles of a group of 3233 men of Japanese ancestry were evaluated. The health of the participants was then monitored for an additional 10 years with the aim of determining any linkage between cholesterol levels and development of Parkinson's disease.

The results published in the March 31, 2008, issue of the journal Movement Disorders revealed that after adjusting the statistical analysis for age, smoking, coffee intake, and other factors, the relative odds for developing Parkinson's disease for those with lower LDL levels (85 milligrams per deciliter) was about twice that of those with higher LDL levels (135 milligrams per deciliter).

"This finding gives us one more piece in the puzzle about the role of cholesterol in Parkinson's disease,” said first author Dr. Xuemei Huang, assistant professor of neurology at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, USA). "Our study again shows an association between low cholesterol and the risk of Parkinson's disease, but we have not shown cause and effect. What makes these results especially useful is the fact that most of the men in this study were not taking cholesterol-lowering drugs such as statins. This suggests that the association between low LDL levels and Parkinson's exists independently from statin use. People taking statins for valid medical reasons should not stop simply to avoid Parkinson's.”


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