Mechanical Stimulation and Cardiovascular Control in Parkinson Disease

In addition to motor symptoms such as postural instability, rigidity, and bradykinesia, Parkinson disease (PD) subjects are characterized by autonomic dysfunction. When assessing the degree of the cardiovascular autonomic dysfunction, relevant information can be obtained from entropy-based complexity analysis of short term beat-to-beat fluctuations of heart period (HP) and systolic arterial pressure (SAP). A novel non-invasive procedure has recently been developed to improve conditions of PD patients through the mechanical stimulation of the fore feet. The present study performed an entropy-based complexity analysis of HP and SAP series in 10 subjects affected by PD in supine position and during 75 degrees head-up tilt test before and after the mechanical stimulation procedure. The results suggest an improvement of vascular control as resulted from a reduction of complexity of SAP series. Future studies are necessary to confirm this promising result over a larger database.