Anagrafe della ricerca

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is the second most prevalent neurodegenerative disorder in the aging population. It is characterized by many motor and non-motor symptoms, with a different impact on patients’ daily life activities, independence, and quality of life. In addition to the typical cardinal motor symptoms, namely bradykinesia, rigidity, and tremor, more commonly affecting the limbs, another group of motor symptoms involving the axis of the body and called axial motor symptoms comes out during the course of the disease. These symptoms proved to be main determinants of reduced independence and quality of life, and can also be a cause of mortality as the primary source of falls and aspiration pneumonia. Moreover, axial symptoms are poorly or not responsive to common therapeutic strategies and are often recognized when their consequences appear, like falls or aspiration pneumonia. A big effort of the research community in the last years has pointed toward the development of e-Health tools for a more granular and accurate detection and quantification of motor symptoms and their fluctuations not only in-clinic but also during patients’ daily life in a more continuous and ecologic way. However, accurate and reliable detection and monitoring of axial symptoms has been partly overlooked and remains a research priority. Against this background, in this project, we aim at developing a system for the detection and monitoring of freezing of gait, postural abnormalities and postural instability, speech issues, and dysphagia using portable technological devices including video cameras, surface EMG probes, and motion sensors. Based on the team’s expertise and preliminary data, we plan to set an adequate system for the quantification of the 4 main axial symptoms, test it on patients in a clinical setting, and export it in an home-like environment, with the final goal of prompting a technological tool for the long-term, ecological, and quantitative detection and assessment of axial symptoms in PD. The research team, composed of a multidisciplinary, heterogeneous but complementary expertise, has the knowledge and the experience to set up the research setting, test adequate technologies and data analysis algorithms based on their previous research, and develop a system to be validated not only in a research setting but also at patients’ home for accurate detection and quantification of PD axial symptoms.