Computer games help people with Parkinson's disease

October 19, 2011 in Psychology & Psychiatry

Playing computer-based physical therapy games can help people with Parkinson's disease improve their gait and balance, according to a new pilot study led by the UCSF School of Nursing and Red Hill Studios, a California serious games developer.

More than half the subjects in the three-month research project showed small improvements in , balance and stride length.

UCSF and Red Hill were the first research team in the United States to receive federal funding in the burgeoning field of low-cost computerized physical therapy games. Unlike off-the-shelf computer games, these specialized games encourage scientifically tested specific physical movements to help people with functional impairments and diseases.

Teams at Red Hill and UCSF collaborated to produce nine "clinically inspired'' games that were designed to improve coordination in people with , a chronic, progressive neuromuscular disease characterized by shaking, slowness of movement, limb and trunk rigidity. The clinical team members at UCSF focused on specific body movements and gestures that their previous research had shown to be beneficial for staving off the physical declines of Parkinson's.

The UCSF team was led by Glenna Dowling, RN, PhD, professor and chair of the UCSF Department of Physiological Nursing, and Marsha Melnick, PT, PhD, a clinical professor in the UCSF School of Medicine's Department of Physical Therapy and and professor emerita of the Department of Physical Therapy at San Francisco State University.

The Red Hill team then designed physical games, similar to Wii and Kinect games, in which subjects win points by moving their bodies in certain ways. Each game has multiple difficulty levels so that the clinical team could customize the therapeutic games for each subject's particular abilities.

"Each subject found his or her own gaming 'sweet spot' – the spot where the physical challenge was not too hard, not too easy, just right,'' said Bob Hone, creative director of Red Hill Studios and the lead principal investigator of the study. "And when subjects mastered one game level, they often moved on to harder levels for more beneficial effect. The subjects improved their games scores while improving their gait and balance.''

Red Hill developed a custom sensor suit with nine tracking sensors to analyze subjects' movements with higher resolution and accuracy than is possible with consumer gaming platforms. The PC-based system sent encrypted data to a secure database allowing the research teams to track the subjects' performance daily.

"From the data tracking we could see that there were some subjects who were playing the games more than the specified three times a week,'' Hone said. "Because this was a highly structured research study, we actually had to ask them to play less than they wanted.''

The trial involved 20 participants in northern California with moderate levels of Parkinson's disease. After playing the games for 12 weeks, 65 percent of players demonstrated longer stride length, 55 percent increased gait velocity, and 55 percent reported improved balance confidence.

"These initial studies show the promise of custom-designed games promoting specific movements and gestures that can help patients get better,'' Dowling said. "Now that we have this preliminary positive result, we want to conduct a longer term clinical trial with more subjects to confirm these initial findings.''

More information: Click here for a video on the therapy games: http://www.redhill … games/pdwii/

Provided by University of California, San Francisco search and more info website

5 /5 (1 vote)  

Rank 5 /5 (1 vote)
Related Stories
Relevant PhysicsForums posts
  • Potential Breakthrough in Seizure Control
    created6 hours ago
  • Popping/Cracked sternum.
    created11 hours ago
  • Which Mental Illness Encompasses This Problem?
    created11 hours ago
  • A question about drug tolerance
    createdMay 23, 2012
  • Poor nutrition leading to overeating?
    createdMay 23, 2012
  • Math and dyslexia?
    createdMay 21, 2012
  • More from Physics Forums - Medical Sciences

More news stories

More mental health care urged for kids who self-harm

(HealthDay) -- Doctors have long known that some kids suffering severe emotional turmoil find relief in physical pain -- cutting or burning or sticking themselves with pins to achieve a form of release.

Psychology & Psychiatry created 22 hours ago | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Questionable research practices surprisingly common

(Medical Xpress) -- Not all scientific misconduct is flat-out fraud. Much falls into the murkier realm of “questionable research practices.” A new study finds that in one field, psychology, these practices are surprisingly ...

Psychology & Psychiatry created May 25, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Feeling strong emotions makes peoples' brains 'tick together'

Experiencing strong emotions synchronises brain activity across individuals, research team at Aalto University and Turku PET Centre in Finland has revealed.

Psychology & Psychiatry created May 24, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Formal recognition of PMDD will lift stigma for women

A decision to recognise premenstrual dysphoric disorder as a genuine psychiatric condition will finally provide “validation for this awful and poorly understood” syndrome and alleviate the stigma ...

Psychology & Psychiatry created May 24, 2012 | popularity 2 / 5 (1) | comments 1

Long-term meditation leads to different brain organization

(Medical Xpress) -- People who practice mindfulness meditation learn to accept their feelings, emotions, and states of mind without judging or resisting them. They simply live in the moment.

Psychology & Psychiatry created May 24, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast


Family history of Alzheimer's affects functional connectivity

(HealthDay) -- Cognitively normal individuals with a family history of late-onset Alzheimer's disease (AD) may display lower resting state functional connectivity in the default mode network (DMN) of the brain, ...

Travel to high altitudes tied to Crohn's, colitis flare-ups

(HealthDay) -- People with inflammatory bowel disease, which includes Crohn's disease and colitis, may be at increased risk for flare-ups when they fly or travel to high altitudes for skiing or mountain climbing, ...

Transvaginal mesh op restores pelvic organ prolapse at price

(HealthDay) -- Transvaginal mesh (TVM) procedures are effective for anatomical restoration of pelvic organ prolapse (POP), but patients report a worsening of sexual function following surgery, according to ...

Cancer may require simpler genetic mutations than previously thought

Chromosomal deletions in DNA often involve just one of two gene copies inherited from either parent. But scientists haven't known how a deletion in one gene from one parent, called a "hemizygous" deletion, can contribute ...

Inherited DNA change explains overactive leukemia gene

A small inherited change in DNA is largely responsible for overactivating a gene linked to poor treatment response in people with acute leukemia.

Skp2 activates cancer-promoting, glucose-processing Akt

HER2 and its epidermal growth factor receptor cousins mobilize a specialized protein to activate a major player in cancer development and sugar metabolism, scientists report in the May 25 issue of Cell.