Drug Use

Certain commonly used substances have been associated with altered risk of PD. Smoking and tobacco use appear to have a protective effect against onset of PD (Allam et al., 2004). Although the nicotine within tobacco products has been suggested to underlie this protective effect (Quik et al., 2008), the mechanism is unclear and may involve a protective action of any of the thousands of chemical species absorbed from tobacco. Some have also suggested that smoking is not directly protective, but that people with PD are by their nature, perhaps because of early disease symptoms, less prone to take up smoking (Allam et al., 2004).

Caffeine consumption has also been identified as a possible protective factor, possibly through its action at adenosine A2A receptors (Schwarzschild et al., 2002). Use of alcohol also appears to reduce the risk for PD (Paganini-Hill et al., 2001), although this is not a consistent finding (Checkoway et al., 2002).

Image from FDA

Use of a number of pharmaceutical drugs has also been associated - although not always consitently - with altered risk of PD. Anti-inflammatory drugs (e.g., NSAIDS), cholesterol-lowering drugs (e.g., statins) and calcium channel blockers (e.g., isradipine) have all been associated with a reduced risk of PD (Esposito et al., 2007; Becker et al., 2008; Becker and Meier, 2009). These are the subjects of ongoing therapeutics research.