Spiral drawing performance as an indicator of fine motor function in people with multiple sclerosis

Evaluation of Graphic Gesture in Parkinson’s Disease

“…The subjects with PD were tested while following withdrawal of levodopa therapy (OFF) and in the on medication condition (ON), in order to highlight the differences caused by the pharmacological treatment on the drawing task. In hand-drawn spirals statistical analysis showed that H subjects drew larger spirals, while PD OFF subjects drew smaller spirals, owing to the presence of micrographia, and according to what was observed in literature (Longstaff & Heath, 2006;Poluha & Teulings, 1998;Mc Lennan et al, 1972). Levodopa treatment appeared to positively influence the dimension of the spiral in the 67.7% of the subjects, who increased dimensions in the on condition with respect to the off condition, and approached control values.…”

“…These studies demonstrate that the pathology causes a worsening in the graphic movement execution and therefore PD patients are impaired in the execution of the automatic movements of writing and drawing (Caligiuri et al, 2006;Lange et al, 2006;Tucha et al, 2006). Spirography is a standard method to test the presence of PD symptoms, such as micrographia or tremor, or to study the strategies adopted by the patients in order to partially counter their deficit (Saunders-Pullman et al, 2008;Longstaff et al, 2006;Longstaff et al, 2003). In particular, hand-drawn spirals allow the study of micrographia and of the motor strategies adopted by the subjects [5,[7][8], because the subjects can freely choose the dimensions of the spiral and their drawing velocity.…”

“…The results of the UPDRS III evaluation and dimensional parameter are summarized in Table 4 Statistical analysis showed that PD OFF subjects drew smaller spirals, so that the shoulder joint was as less involved as possible, and motor control could therefore increase (Longstaff & Heath, 2006;Longstaff et al, 2003). Significant differences were found between the spiral dimensions in the OFF vs. ON condition (table 5): levodopa decreases the entity of tremor and bradykinesia and, as a result, leads to better motor control and thus larger movements.…”

Contribution of execution noise to arm movement variability in three-dimensional space

“…Execution noise also arises from both peripheral and central mechanisms and can have profound effects on movement variability (Buneo et al 1995;van Beers et al 2004). Understanding how planning-and execution-related noise interact is critical not only for explaining movement variability that is observed in neurologically intact human subjects but also for comprehending the exaggerated variability that arises following nervous system damage (Contreras-Vidal and Buch 2003;Hermsdorfer and Goldenberg 2002;Longstaff and Heath 2006;Thies et al 2009). In addition, the effects of this interaction are relevant to understanding such diverse sensorimotor functions as position estimation (van Beers et al 1998(van Beers et al , 1999(van Beers et al , 2002b, cue integration (Kording and Wolpert 2004), and motor adaptation (van Beers 2009).…”

A Study on the Diagnosis of Parkinson’s Disease using Digitized Wacom Graphics Tablet Dataset

“…A common disease of the central nervous system among the elderly [2], Parkinson's disease (PD) is currently incurable [3]. The correct diagnosis of this disease is very difficult [4], but proper treatment of this disease can ease the symptoms and improve the quality of life of patients significantly [3]. Its complex symptoms bring about challenges for the clinical diagnosis [2].…”