Objective: To assess the ability of a handheld device and its accompanying data analytics to distinguish between Parkinson’s disease (PD) and other tremor disorders.

Background: The differential diagnosis between PD and other tremor disorders still poses a challenge, especially at the early stages of the disease. An objective assessment of the patients’ tremor and motor skills is a valuable tool in clinical practice, assisting in the diagnosis of PD and other movement disorders with tremor.

Method: We assessed fine motor skills in 108 patients with movement disorders (68 PD, 40 non-PD patients). Data were collected while the patients were completing drawing and writing tasks on a tablet with a proprietary multi-sensor digital pen (NeuroMotor Pen) intended to measure and analyse neuromotor function. We extracted and analysed 123 features quantifying multiple symptoms of the disease.

Results: The analysis revealed a subset of five features which serve as biomarkers for differential diagnosis between PD and non-PD patients. A classifier was built based on those five features, and it was tested on a separate set of 12 PD and 15 patients with other tremor disorders, achieving 85.2% accuracy (93.3% specificity, 75.0% sensitivity).

Conclusion: The device shows potential in assisting in the differential diagnosis between PD and other tremor disorders. The accuracy level of the classifier is comparable to current diagnostic imaging practices (DaTSCAN). Clinical use of the device will enable cost and workflow benefits as well as patient benefits. It will also allow identifying early stage patients for clinical trials on medications.

« Back to 2022 International Congress

MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/objective-and-easily-performed-assessment-of-fine-motor-skills-to-support-the-differential-diagnosis-of-parkinsons-disease-and-other-movement-disorders-with-tremor/