An efficient Parkinson's disease detection framework: Leveraging time-frequency representation and AlexNet convolutional neural network

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder affecting the quality of life of over 10 million individuals worldwide. Early diagnosis is crucial for timely intervention and better patient outcomes. Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals are commonly used for early PD diagnosis due to their potential in monitoring disease progression. But traditional EEG-based methods lack exploration of brain regions that provide essential information about PD, and their performance falls short for real-time applications. To address these limitations, this study proposes a novel approach using a Time-Frequency Representation (TFR) based AlexNet Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) model to explore EEG channel-based analysis and identify critical brain regions efficiently diagnosing PD from EEG data. The Wavelet Scattering Transform (WST) is employed to capture distinct temporal and spectral characteristics, while AlexNet CNN is utilized to detect complex spatial patterns at different scales, accurately identifying intricate EEG patterns associated with PD. The experiment results on two real-time EEG PD datasets: San Diego dataset and the Iowa dataset demonstrate that frontal and central brain regions, including AF4 and AFz electrodes, contribute significantly to providing more representative features compared to other regions for PD detection. The proposed architecture achieves an impressive accuracy of 99.84% for the San Diego dataset and 95.79% for the Iowa dataset, outperforming existing EEG-based PD detection methods. The findings of this research will assist to create an essential technology for efficient PD diagnosis, enhancing patient care and quality of life.