WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - A Rutgers Health study has found that penicillin antibiotics is significantly associated with Parkinson's, a progressive brain disorder that affects movement and balance.
Published in Parkinsonism & Related Disorders, the study analyzed medical records from over 93,000 people in the United Kingdom.
Researchers found that people prescribed multiple courses of penicillin antibiotics have a 15 percent lower risk of developing Parkinson's.
'We found an inverse dose-response relationship between number of penicillin courses and Parkinson's disease risk across multiple durations,' said lead author Gian Pal. 'This was unexpected and contrasts with some prior studies.'
The study also found that people who took two or more courses of antifungal medications in the five years before diagnosis had about a 16 percent higher risk of Parkinson's.
'These are all very mild, so it should not influence decisions about when to use antibiotics or antifungals,' Pal said. 'The importance of the study is that it speaks to the idea that something is going on in the gut microbiome could influence Parkinson's disease.'
Researchers emphasize the need to further research to determine the link between specific fungi or bacteria and a person's risk of Parkinson's.
'Better understanding what the antifungal composition is in the gut -- which really hasn't been well explored -- and seeing if that is useful in distinguishing Parkinson's patients from non-Parkinson's patients would be useful,' Pal said.
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