A service development study of the assessment and management of fracture risk in Parkinson's disease

J Neurol. 2014 Jun;261(6):1153-9. doi: 10.1007/s00415-014-7333-8. Epub 2014 Apr 10.

Abstract

Parkinson's disease (PD) is associated with an increased risk of fragility fracture. FRAX and Qfracture are risk calculators that estimate the 10-year risk of hip and major fractures and guide definitive investigation for osteoporosis using dual X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA) imaging. It is unclear which PD patients should be considered for fracture risk assessment and whether FRAX or Qfracture should be used. Seventy-seven patients with PD were recruited in the movement disorders clinic. Data were collected on PD-related characteristics and fracture risk scores were calculated. Patients with previous osteoporotic fractures had a higher incidence of falls (p = 0.0026) and use of bilateral walking aids (p = 0.0187) in addition to longer disease duration (p = 0.0037). Selecting patients with falls in combination with either disease duration >5 years, bilateral walking aids, or previous osteoporotic fracture distinguished patients with and without previous osteoporotic fracture with specificity 67.7 % (95 % CI 55.0-78.8) and sensitivity 100.0 % (95 % CI 73.5-100.0). Qfracture calculated significantly higher fracture risk scores than FRAX for hip (p < 0.0001) and major (p = 0.0008) fracture in PD patients. Receiver operating characteristic curves demonstrated that FRAX outperformed Qfracture with an area under the curve of 0.84 (95 % CI 0.70-0.97, p = 0.0004) for FRAX and 0.68 (95 % CI 52-86, p = 0.0476) for Qfracture major fracture risk calculators. We suggest that falls in combination with either a disease duration longer than 5 years or bilateral walking aids or previous osteoporotic fracture should be used as red flags in PD patients to prompt clinicians to perform a FRAX fracture risk assessment in the neurology clinic.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Absorptiometry, Photon
  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Aged, 80 and over
  • Disease Management*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Osteoporotic Fractures* / diagnosis
  • Osteoporotic Fractures* / etiology
  • Osteoporotic Fractures* / therapy
  • Parkinson Disease / complications*
  • ROC Curve
  • Risk Assessment / methods*
  • Surveys and Questionnaires
  • Time Factors
  • Walking / physiology