Why do some Parkinson's patients develop depression?

Depression is one of the most common and disabling non-motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, yet we know little about why some people with PD develop it. 

A new study from Jeff Bronstein, Beate Ritz, and colleagues at David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA analyzed genetic data from three large population-based studies and found that a higher burden of variants in KRTCAP2, an immune-related gene, was linked to about 20% higher odds of depression in people with PD. 

A general depression genetic risk score was also associated with depression in PD, while the PD risk score was not. The findings suggest depression in PD draws on both shared and disease-specific biology and may point to immune pathways as a place to look for new treatments. 

Read the entire paper: Gene-based association analysis of depression risk among European ancestry Parkinson’s disease patients