Quantitative assessment of arm tremor in people with neurological disorders. Conference Paper uri icon

abstract

  • Abnormal oscillatory movement (i.e. tremor) is usually evaluated with qualitative assessment by clinicians, and quantified with subjective scoring methods. These methods are often inaccurate. We utilized a quantitative and standardized task based on the Fitts' law to assess the performance of arm movement with tremor by controlling a gyration mouse on a computer. The experiment included the center-out tapping (COT) and rectangular track navigation (RTN) tasks. We report the results of a pilot study in which we collected the performance for healthy participants in whom tremor was simulated by imposing oscillatory movements to the arm with a vibration motor. We compared their movement speed and accuracy with and without the artificial "tremor." We found that the artificial tremor significantly affected the path efficiency for both tasks (COT: 56.8 vs. 46.2%, p <; 0.05; RTN: 94.2 vs. 67.4%, p <; 0.05), and we were able to distinguish the presence of tremor. From this result, we expect to quantify severity of tremor and the effectiveness therapy for tremor patients.

name of conference

  • 2016 38th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC)

published proceedings

  • Annu Int Conf IEEE Eng Med Biol Soc

altmetric score

  • 3.5

author list (cited authors)

  • Jeonghee Kim, .., Parnell, C., Wichmann, T., & DeWeerth, S. P.

citation count

  • 4

complete list of authors

  • Parnell, Claire||Wichmann, Thomas||DeWeerth, Stephen P

publication date

  • August 2016