Objective: We investigated changes in indices of muscle synergies prior to gait initiation and the effects of gaze shift in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). A long-term objective of the study is to develop a method for quantitative assessment of gait-initiation problems in PD.
Methods: PD patients without clinical signs of postural instability and two control groups (age-matched and young) performed a gait initiation task in a self-paced manner, with and without a quick prior gaze shift produced by turning the head. Muscle groups with parallel scaling of activation levels (muscle modes) were identified as factors in the muscle activation space. Synergy index stabilizing center of pressure trajectory in the anterior-posterior and medio-lateral directions (indices of stability) was quantified in the muscle mode space. A drop in the synergy index in preparation to gait initiation (anticipatory synergy adjustment, ASA) was quantified.
Results: Compared to the control groups, PD patients showed significantly smaller synergy indices and ASA for both directions of the center of pressure shift. Both PD and age-matched controls, but not younger controls, showed detrimental effects of the prior gaze shift on the ASA indices.
Conclusions: PD patients without clinically significant posture or gait disorders show impaired stability of the center of pressure and its diminished adjustment during gait initiation.
Significance: The indices of stability and ASA may be useful to monitor pre-clinical gait disorders, and lower ASA may be relevant to emergence of freezing of gait in PD.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.clinph.2023.06.022 | DOI Listing |
Sensors (Basel)
January 2025
German Center for Vertigo and Balance Disorders (DSGZ), LMU University Hospital, LMU Munich, 81377 Munich, Germany.
Instrumented gait analysis is widely used in clinical settings for the early detection of neurological disorders, monitoring disease progression, and evaluating fall risk. However, the gold-standard marker-based 3D motion analysis is limited by high time and personnel demands. Advances in computer vision now enable markerless whole-body tracking with high accuracy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Clin Med
January 2025
Department of Rehabilitation, Oita Oka Hospital, Oita 870-0105, Japan.
This study aimed to examine the impact of early postoperative physical therapy combined with an educational program on wound recurrence and quality of life in patients with foot ulcers. Forty-eight postoperative patients with diabetic foot ulcers were randomly assigned to either an intervention group, which received both physical therapy and an educational program ( = 25), or a control group, which received physical therapy only ( = 23). Each intervention was initiated on the day after surgery in both groups.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBiomedicines
January 2025
Departments of Neurosurgery, Hualien Tzu Chi Hospital, Buddhist Tzu Chi Medical Foundation, No. 707, Sec. 3, Zhongyang Rd., Hualien City 970, Hualien County, Taiwan.
: To determine whether epidural electrical stimulation (EES) improves sensory recovery and walking function in patients with chronic spinal cord injury (SCI) with a grade on the American Spinal Cord Injury Association impairment scale (AIS) of C or D at the cervical level. : Three individuals with cervical-level chronic AIS D SCI were enrolled in the study. The mean injury duration and age were 4.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNeurol Int
January 2025
Laboratório de Marcha, Centro de Medicina de Reabilitação de Alcoitão, 2649-506 Alcabideche, Portugal.
Background/objectives: Post-stroke hemiparetic gait often presents with asymmetric patterns to compensate for stability deficits. This study examines gait differences in chronic stroke patients with spastic hemiparesis based on initial foot contact type-forefoot versus rearfoot.
Methods: Thirty-four independently walking spastic hemiparetic patients were retrospectively analyzed.
Clin Biomech (Bristol)
January 2025
Univ. Polytechnique Hauts-de-France, LAMIH, CNRS, UMR 8201, F-59313 Valenciennes, France.
Background: Multiple sclerosis induces locomotor impairments. The objective was to characterize the effects of Multiple Sclerosis on whole-body angular momentum control during gait initiation.
Methods: Fifteen patients with Multiple Sclerosis with Expanded Disability status scale of 2.
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