The aim of this paper is to develop and evaluate a multi-sensor data fusion platform for quantifying Parkinson’s disease (PD) motor states. More specifically, the aim is to evaluate the clinimetric properties (validity, reliability, and responsiveness to treatment) of the method, using data from motion sensors during lower- and upper-limb tests.
Methods: Nineteen PD patients and 22 healthy controls were recruited in a single center study. Subjects performed standardized motor tasks of Unified PD Rating Scale (UPDRS), including leg agility, hand rotation, and walking after wearing motion sensors on ankles and wrists. PD patients received a single levodopa dose before and at follow-up time points after the dose administration. Patients were video recorded and their motor symptoms were rated by three movement disorder experts. Experts rated each and every test occasions based on the six items of UPDRS-III (motor section), the treatment response scale (TRS) and the dyskinesia score. Spatiotemporal features were extracted from the sensor data. Features from lower limbs and upper limbs were fused. Feature selection methods of stepwise regression (SR), Lasso regression and principle component analysis (PCA) were used to select the most important features. Different machine learning methods of linear regression (LR), decision trees, and support vector machines were examined and their clinimetric properties were assessed.
Results: Treatment response index from multimodal motion sensors (TRIMMS) scores obtained from the most valid method of LR when using data from all tests. Features were selected by SR, and this method resulted in r=0.95 to TRS. The test-retest reliability of TRIMMS was good with intra-class correlation coefficient of 0.82. Responsiveness of the TRIMMS to levodopa treatment was similar to the responsiveness of TRS.
Conclusions: The results from this study indicate that fusing motion sensors data gathered during standardized motor tasks leads to valid, reliable and sensitive objective measurements of PD motor symptoms. These measurements could be further utilized in studies for individualized optimization of treatments in PD.
2019.