Effects of auditory cues in gait and adaptive walking in Parkinson's disease patients.

Abstract

Disorders in gait are identified in Parkinson's disease patients. As a result, the capacity of walking independently and the interaction with the environment can be impairment. A complex environment can even threaten the motor control of these patients to perform the locomotor tasks successfully. Besides of the levodopa therapy, the auditory cues have also been utilized to improve the gait parameters. However, it's not known the effects of auditory cues in gait during avoidance obstacles and the association with the levodopa effects. Yet, few studies in the literature compare the Parkinson's disease patients with the older adults during the locomotor tasks and obstacle avoidance in association with the effects of auditory cues. In order to answer these questions, this project is composed by two studies: Study 1, which aim is to investigate the effects of auditory cues in the gait parameters in Parkinson's disease patients and older adults; and Study 2, which aim is to investigate the effects of auditory cues during obstacle avoidance in Parkinson's disease patients and older adults. In both studies, the effects of levodopa therapy will also be investigated. So, the patients are going to be tested in on and off levodopa state. 30 subjects distributed in two groups (Group 1, Parkinson's disease patients; Group 2, healthy older adults) are going to participate of this study. After the participation approval, the assessment of clinical condition will be done based on the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale and the Hoehn and Yahr scale. Therefore, kinematic, kinetic and electromiographic analyses will be utilized to investigate the locomotor pattern. Specifically, in the Study 2, two different obstacle heights will be manipulated (high obstacle at half of knee height; low obstacle at ankle height). In order to verify possible differences between the groups and the experimental condition for each analyses, multivariance tests will be used with a significance level of p<0.05.