Using Ecological Whole Body Kinematics to Evaluate Effects of Medication Adjustment in Parkinson Disease
Date
2014
Authors
Rahimi, F.
Bee, C.
Duval, C.
Biossy, P.
Edwards, Roderick
Jog, M.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Journal of Parkinson's Disease
Abstract
Background: Functional motor impairments including mobility are major reasons for clinical intervention and medication
adjustment in symptomatic therapy for Parkinson’s disease (PD). Outcome measures used to assess the impact of medication are
mostly based on patients’ memory or diaries which, considering the gaps between visits, are neither objective nor very reliable.
Objective: Investigating the feasibility of using movement features extracted from ecological whole-body kinematics recordings
to measure the quantitative and qualitative changes in multiple aspects of mobility after medication changes in PD.
Methods: Eleven patients with PD (PwPD) performed mobility tasks in their own home, wearing a full body wireless inertial
sensing based motion capture system. Three scripted walking tasks (walking, fast walking, and walk turns) were examined
at baseline and two weeks after medication changes. Clinical scales, including investigator-rated clinical global impression of
improvement (CGI-I), were collected at both visits.
Results: Out of 59 recorded body joint variables, five were identified as pertinent. Changes were represented in vector space as a
plot of mean versus peak amplitude. Regression analysis was used to predict clinical improvement or worsening based on these
vector features. The predictors were able to explain (>98.5% of variance) patients’ clinical global impression of improvement,
thus correctly predicting 5 cases of improvement and 2 cases of worsening.
Conclusions: This study provided a method of extracting clinically meaningful reports from ecological kinematic data showing
changes after drug adjustments. The results are presented using a novel concept called change space that may be more
understandable for clinical staff.
Description
Keywords
Parkinson's disease (PD), kinematics, mobility limitations, follow-up studies, biomedical engineering
Citation
Rahimi, F., Bee, C., Duval, C., Boissy, P., Edwards, R., Jog, M., & the EMAP Group. (2014). Using Ecological Whole Body Kinematics to Evaluate Effects of Medication Adjustment in Parkinson Disease. Journal of Parkinson’s Disease, 4, 617-627. https://doi.org/10.3233/JPD-140370