The Effect of High-Volume Walking With Visual Cues (VC) in Parkinson´s Disease (PD)

University of Iceland

Status and phase: Completed; Phase 3

Conditions: Parkinson´s Disease

Treatments: Other: Visual Cues; Other: Walking without visual cues

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT01391741

123SmOkE

Details and patient eligibility

About

People with disease (PD) tend to walk with short steps, decreased velocity, and increased stride time variability. Short steps and increased variability are related to greater fall risk. In addition, concurrent performance of a cognitive task (dual-task (DT)) has marked effects on gait in people with PD which is considered to reflect an impaired automaticity of gait.

Objective: To investigate short and long term effects of high-volume walking with visual spatial cues (VSC) on gait variables, automaticity, and functional mobility, in people with Parkinson´s Disease (PD), compared with walking without VSC.

Enrollment: 26 patients

Sex: All

Ages: Under 79 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• a confirmed diagnosis of PD according to the UK Parkinson´s Disease Society Brain Bank Clinical Diagnostic Criteria (18)
• <80 years of age
• community residing
• Hoehn and Yahr (HY) stage 2-3
• Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) score of >23
• ability to walk without walking aids for a total of 20 minutes over a 30-minute period

Exclusion criteria

• major modifications of Parkinson´s medication (Madopar >200 mg/d or >20% increase in Dopamine agonists) 3 weeks prior to baseline assessment
• comorbidities or disabilities, which might influence walking
• a history of brain surgery

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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26 participants in 2 patient groups

Walking with visual cues

Experimental group

Description:

Walking with visual cues for 30 minutes, 4 times a week for 4 weeks

Treatment:

Other: Visual Cues

Walking without visual cues

Active Comparator group

Description:

Walking without visual cues, but verbal encouragement twice a week to take longer steps, for 30 minutes, 4 times a week for 4 weeks.

Treatment:

Other: Walking without visual cues