2017 Reports

Prevalence, Incidence, P/I Ratio, and Main Causes and Hazard Ratio of Death in Patients with Parkinson’s Disease in South Korea: A Nationwide Population-based Retrospective Cohort Study

Kim, Hyoung Seop; Lee, Hong-Jae; Lim, Hyun-Sun; Cha, Jiook; Kime, Hye Won

There has been no nationwide epidemiologic study on patients with PD in South Korea.The aims of this study were to determine the prevalence, incidence, and P/I ratio of Parkinson’s disease (PD) in South Korea and to present basic epidemiological information on PD patients for making effective health policies.

Methods
We used National Health Insurance Service-National Sample Cohort (KNHIS-NSC) data to analyze the prevalence, incidence, and P/I ratio of PD from 2003 to 2013 and then followed up using the NHID in 2008 to obtain the hazard ratio (HR) of death in PD itself and other comorbidities from 2008 to 2013.

Results
The prevalence and incidence of PD increased rapidly from 72.9 and 32.8 in 2003 to 213.4 and 58.0 in 2013, and the P/I ratio increased from 2.22 in 2003 to 3.62 in 2013. The prevalence, incidence, and P/I ratio of PD were all higher in women than in men. The hazard ratio for death was significantly higher in PD patients (15.36) compared to subjects without the disease. Stroke was the most frequent cause of death in the PD patient population followed by cancer and pneumonia.

Conclusion
The prevalence, incidence, and P/I ratio of PD rapidly increased as the years progressed. This indirectly proves that the health insurance system in Korea is efficient and has allowed patients with PD to access medical facilities more easily. However, a newer public healthy strategy should be established for patients with PD because PD itself has a high HR for death, and patients with PD have a high mortality rate when stroke and pneumonia are also involved.