Association between new-onset Parkinson’s disease and suicide risk in South Korea: a nationwide cohort study

BACKGROUND: Parkinson’s disease (PD) is an increasingly common neurodegenerative disease in an aging society. Whether PD is associated with an increased suicide risk is unclear. Thus, we investigated the effect of new-onset PD on suicide. METHODS: Using the National Health Insurance Service Senior Sample Cohort of South Korea, 17,143 incident PD patients and 17,143 risk set controls, matched by propensity score, were selected for follow-up. The incidence rate of suicide and 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated based on a generalized linear model of the Poisson distribution. Effect sizes were expressed as hazard ratios (HRs) using the Cox proportional hazards model with a robust variance estimator that incorporated clustering within matched pairs. RESULTS: The incidence rate of suicide was 206.7 cases per 100,000 person-years (95% CI, 172.8–246.9) among the PD cohort. Compared to the matched controls, patients with PD were 2.64 times (HR, 2.64; 95% CI, 1.31–5.30) more likely to commit suicide during the first 180 days of follow-up and 2.47 times (HR, 2.47; 95% CI, 1.42–4.28) within the first 365 days of follow-up. During the entire follow-up period, patients with PD were 2.26 times more likely to commit suicide than were their matched controls (HR, 2.26; 95% CI, 1.67–3.06). CONCLUSION: Our findings indicated an increased risk of suicide in patients with new-onset PD, regardless of the period after diagnosis. Incorporating mental health care with social and environmental interventions into primary care and PD-specialized care can help reduce suicide risk in people with PD, improving suicide prevention, identification, and risk assessment. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12888-022-03990-4.