Reduced Gray Matter Volume and Risk of Falls in Parkinson’s Disease with Dementia Patients: A Voxel-Based Morphometry Study

Purpose: Risk of falls is a common sequela affecting patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD). Although motor impairment and dementia are correlated with falls, associations of brain structure and cognition deficits with falls remain unclear. Material and Methods: Thirty-five PD patients with dementia (PDD), and 37 age- and sex-matched healthy subjects were recruited for this study. All participants received structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, and disease severity and cognitive evaluations. Additionally, patient fall history was recorded. Regional structural differences between PDD with and without fall groups were performed using voxel-based morphometry processing. Stepwise logistic regression analysis was used to predict the fall risk in PDD patients. Results: The results revealed that 48% of PDD patients experienced falls. Significantly lower gray matter volume (GMV) in the left calcarine and right inferior frontal gyrus in PDD patients with fall compared to PDD patients without fall were noted. The PDD patients with fall exhibited worse UPDRS-II scores compared to PDD patients without fall and were negatively correlated with lower GMV in the left calcarine (p/r = 0.004/−0.492). Furthermore, lower GMV in the left calcarine and right inferior frontal gyrus correlated with poor attention and executive functional test scores. Multiple logistic regression analysis showed that the left calcarine was the only variable (p = 0.004, 95% CI = 0.00–0.00) negatively associated with the fall event. Conclusions: PDD patients exhibiting impaired motor function, lower GMV in the left calcarine and right inferior frontal gyrus, and notable cognitive deficits may have increased risk of falls.