Anxiety is a common non-motor symptom of Parkinson’s disease (PD). There is no specific pharmacological intervention for people with PD who experience anxiety. Current non-pharmacological treatments have mixed or inconclusive results and there does not appear to be a non-pharmacological intervention for people with PD disease and anxiety that focuses on activity and participation.

To co-produce an occupation-focused complex intervention to help people with PD live well with anxiety that community-based occupational therapists can deliver.

Six-stage complex intervention development was conducted using online logic modelling and a participatory approach to organise the new intervention’s key inputs, processes and outcomes important to people with PD living with anxiety.

Data were collected via online logic modelling sessions involving people with Parkinson’s, care partners and occupational therapists across the UK from April 2022 to June 2022.

34 participants were recruited (people with PD n=14, care partners n=9, occupational therapists n=11) for the online logic modelling sessions.

Resources to support the new intervention (‘inputs’) include adequate resourcing, education for professionals and people with PD, flexibility of delivery methods and goal setting. The intervention’s actions to produce outcomes (‘processes’) should include 1:1 support, lifestyle management, providing meaningful information, collaborative goal setting, therapeutic use of everyday activities, and involvement of friends and families. The intended results (‘outcomes’) should include a reduction in anxiety symptoms, people with PD enjoying more meaningful activities, increased understanding of anxiety and PD, improvement in clinical outcomes and improvement of service-level outcomes. These key aspects were incorporated into an intervention manual, educational material and training video.

We have systematically coproduced a new occupation-focused complex intervention to help people with PD to live well with anxiety. This provides the basis for the next project in which this intervention will be tested for feasibility.

ISRCTN62762494.