Incidence of Anxiety in Parkinson's Disease During the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Pandemic

Abstract

L E T T E R S : N E W O B S E R V A T I O N S Incidence of Anxiety in Parkinson’s Disease During the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Pandemic The recent pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID- 19) have forced countries to be under lockdown, 1 with strict emphasis being placed on self-isolation and social distancing. 2 The major impact of this mandate is on patients with chronic diseases.3 Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a chronic neurodegener- ative disease, and anxiety is one of the most frequent neuro- psychiatric disorders in PD, with an incidence higher than in any other chronic medical diseases (38% vs. 11%). 4 The recent outbreak of coronavirus in Iran could be a contributing factor for worsening anxiety in this group of individuals. Therefore, to test this hypothesis we undertook this study by quantifying anxiety levels using the Beck Anxiety Inventory