“The impact of anxiety and upper limb disability on participation levels in people with dystonia: an observational cross-sectional case-control study”

OBJECTIVE This study sought to evaluate the level of anxiety in people with dystonia and to examine a possible relationship between the level of participation, anxiety, and functional limitations. DESIGN An observational, cross-sectional, case-control study with 12 cases of focal dystonia and 12 healthy controls aged between 18 and 75 years old. The Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAM-A), the QuickDASH scale and the Measure of Participation and ACTivities (IMPACT-S) were used. Differences in scores and effect size were analyzed through the Student's t-test and Cohen's d test. A multiple regression model was performed to determine the relationship between variables. RESULTS People with dystonia obtained higher scores in the three subsections of the HAM-A (total anxiety, psychiatric anxiety and somatic anxiety; p 0.05). CONCLUSIONS This study suggests that the ability of people with dystonia to participate in society is negatively affected by the level of disability of the upper limb, but even when anxiety-age-related differences were controlled for, no relationship was found between variables.