Early detection of Parkinson´s disease through automatic movement evaluation

Therapy for a patient with a neurological disease is more effective the earlier it is started. This also means a better quality of life for the patient and more effective health care for the country. Movement disorders may indicate several neurological diseases (including Parkinson´s disease (PD)) before other diagnostic methods may reveal them. In this article a measurement technique is described that can be used to diagnose PD including the movement patterns to be analyzed, the necessary measurement set-up based on the PRIMAS precision motion analyzer, and the evaluation algorithms. The aim of the described work is to develop a screening test that could also be applied to patients already diagnosed as Parkinsonians to objectively measure the progress of the disease and/or the efficiency of the therapy