Publications by authors named "V Pursiainen"

We study the role of social connections in compliance of U.S. households with mobility restrictions imposed in response to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, using aggregated and anonymized Facebook data on social connections and mobile phone data for measuring social distancing at the county level.

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Background: Deep brain stimulation (DBS) has been used for treatment of advanced Parkinson's disease (PD) since 1990's. Duodenal levodopa infusion (DLI) has been available since 2006.

Materials And Methods: Patient records of DLI patients and clinical data of DBS patients from 2006-2010 were requested from all university and central hospitals in Finland.

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Background: Non-motor symptoms are a major contributor to quality of life in patients with advanced Parkinson's disease (PD). Duodenal levodopa infusion (DLI) has been shown to alleviate motor fluctuations, but data on its possible effect on non-motor symptoms are scarce. The aim of the study was to assess the effect of DLI on blood pressure (BP), sweating, and non-motor symptoms.

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Our study aimed to investigate the cardiovascular autonomic regulation related to the wearing-off phenomenon in Parkinson's disease (PD). We measured blood pressure (BP) and heart rate (HR) at rest and during orthostatic test in 16 patients with PD with wearing-off and in 15 patients with PD without wearing-off both before (baseline) and repetitively at 1-h intervals for up to 4 h after the morning PD medication dose. The patients with wearing-off had fluctuation of BP during the observation period, BP increasing when the motor performance worsened and vice versa.

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Disorders of the autonomic nervous system are common in Parkinson's disease (PD). Earlier studies suggest that some nonmotor symptoms may fluctuate with the motor symptoms, but the possible interrelationship between motor phenomena and sweating has not been studied. The authors measured sweating by using an evaporimeter on three different areas of the body (right hand, left hand, chest) immediately before the morning PD medication (baseline), and thereafter hourly up to 4 hour, in 16 PD patients with wearing-off type of motor fluctuations and in 15 patients without clinical motor fluctuations.

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