| Author: | Ip, Wai-leung Raymond |
| Title: | Effect of spatial and temporal constraint on gait performance in people with Parkinson's disease |
| Degree: | M.Sc. |
| Year: | 2007 |
| Subject: | Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations. |
| Department: | Department of Rehabilitation Sciences |
| Pages: | x, 65 leaves : ill. ; 31 cm. |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | Patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD) are known to manifest gait problems. Previous studies revealed further gait deterioration when walking through narrow walkway or obstacles (spatial constraint). Moreover, clinically, it was common to see PD patients to have deterioration of gait while walking in time-restricted condition (temporal constraint) such as walking across zebra-crossing. However, no previous study has investigated the effect of different degree of spatial constraint and temporal constraint on gait performance of PD patients. Therefore, this study aimed at evaluating the effect of spatial and temporal constraints in gait performance in people with PD. Sixteen PD patients during on stage of medication (10 males, 6 females) and 19 healthy control subjects of similar age, gender, weight and height from the community completed the study. Subjects were required to walk along the GaitRite walkway under 8 conditions: no constraint, spatial constraint (narrow walkway), temporal constraint (simulated traffic light sound), and spatial and temporal constraints in a random order. The gait parameters velocity, cadence and stride length were analyzed using 2-way repeated measure ANOVA. Results demonstrated that PD patients walked with significantly slower velocity and shorter stride length when than control subjects during walking at natural and fast speed (p<0.01). However, these patients did not show gait deterioration under spatial or, temporal constraint conditions. Instead, they walked with significantly faster velocity, faster cadence and longer stride length under spatial or temporal constraint when walking at their natural speed (p<0.05). In our study, PD patients did not have gait deterioration even when they walked under spatial, temporal, or spatio-temporal constraint conditions. It might be because PD patients deteriorated only when they walked under of a change of walking environment such as getting in and out of the doorway. Walking through a uniform walkway, even it was narrow, might not affect their gait performance. Another reason could be an increase in the attention during testing. Further study is necessary to simulate environment like zebra crossing so as to induce gait deterioration in PD patients and investigate spatial and temporal constraint in gait of PD patients. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | restricted access |
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| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| b20902505.pdf | For All Users (off-campus access for PolyU Staff & Students only) | 6.09 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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