Mental Practice Combined With Physical Practice to Improve the Gait Performance of People With Parkinson's Disease
Mental Practice Combined With Physical Practice to Improve the Gait Performance of People With Parkinson's Disease
Among the impairments associated to Parkinson's disease, gait disturbance is one of which
 that has the most negative impact on the independence in daily living activities and quality
 of life of people living with Parkinson's disease. Despite the considerable amount of
 research, we have no consensus about the most efficient physiotherapeutic approach to improve
 the gait disturbance. Mental practice is considered an efficient strategy to improve the
 motor performance in healthy individuals and people with stroke. However, there is scarce
 evidence about its therapeutic results to improve the gait performance in people living with
 Parkinson's disease. Thus, the aim of this study is to investigate the effects of gait mental
 practice associated to physical practice to improve the gait performance in people living
 with Parkinson's disease.
Background: Among the impairments associated to Parkinson's disease, the gait disturbance is
 one of which that has the most negative impact on the independence in daily living activities
 and quality of life of people living with Parkinson's disease. Despite the considerable
 amount of research, we have no consensus about the most efficient physiotherapeutic approach
 to improve the gait disturbance. Mental practice is considered an efficient strategy to
 improve the motor performance in healthy individuals and people with stroke. However, there
 is scarce evidence about its therapeutic results to improve the gait performance in people
 living with Parkinson's disease.

 Objectives: To investigate the effects of mental gait practice associated with physical
 practice to improve the gait performance of people living with Parkinson's disease.

 Design: Parallel, prospective, double-blind, multicentre randomized clinical trial.

 Setting: Brazilian Parkinson Association.

 Participants: Twenty-two people living with Parkinson's disease in stages 2-3 of disease
 evolution according to Hoehn and Yahr Classification.

 Interventions: The participants will be randomly allocated in an experimental group and a
 control group. Both groups will perform 10 individual training sessions, two times per week,
 for five weeks. The training sessions consist of four blocks of mental practice intercalated
 with four blocks of physical practice of gait under different conditions. The only difference
 between the groups will be the content of mental practice blocks: the experimental group will
 perform mental practice of gait while the control group performs non-gait mental practice.

 Randomization: Participants will be randomized by ClinStat software into one of two groups:
 Experimental Group (EG), which will perform gait mental practice; and Control Group (CG),
 which will perform the non-gait mental practice.

 Statistical analysis: The training effects for each primary and secondary outcome measure
 will be analyzed for the two training conditions (i.e., control and experimental) at the four
 assessment time points (i.e., pre-intervention, 7 days post-completion and at 30 and 60-day
 follow-up) using a mixed-design ANOVA with training as the between-group factor and the
 assessment time point as the within-group factor. The effect sizes (ES) will be calculated
 for all comparisons at alpha = 0.05. A Tukey HSD post-hoc test will be used for multiple
 comparisons and p-values below 5 % will be considered as statistically significant.
Inclusion Criteria:

 -  diagnosis of Parkinson's disease according to the United Kingdom Brain Bank criteria;

 -  in stage 2-3 of the disease evolution according to the Hoehn and Yahr;

 -  treated with levodopa or its synergists;

 -  capable to walk independently indoors without aid;

 -  referring 5 years of education or more.

 Exclusion Criteria:

 -  presence of other neurological (excluding PD), orthopedic or cardiopulmonary problems;

 -  visual and auditory deficiency uncorrected;

 -  dementia [assessed by Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), cut-off 26];

 -  depression [according to the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15), cut-off 6];

 -  declined imagery capacity [according to the Revised Movement Imagery Questionnaire
 (MIQ-R) cut-off 10].