A Brief Overview: The Utility of Wearable Motion Sensor Technology for Neurodegenerative Diseases

Neurodegenerative diseases are conditions that affect a patient’s motor function capabilities, hindering human movement, limiting the ability to perform activities of daily living (ADLs) and negatively impacting patient quality of life (QoL). Currently, clinical assessments are subjective in nature, and quantitative assessment would be an excellent supplemental tool to provide clinicians with support in clinical decision making. Inertial measurement units (IMUs) are unique sensor-based technologies with potential applicability as clinical assessment technology in patients with neurodegenerative diseases. Moreover, gold-standard motion capture (MOCAP) technology is expensive and limited to research-specific use, making it unavailable to patients and, therefore, impractical for clinical use. IMU sensor-based technology can track human movement in real-time, are cost-effective, and provide data to the clinician as a quantitative output. Thus, it is the aim of this paper to discuss the potential use of IMU sensors as a clinically relevant tool.