Engineering Commons^™

Effect Of Levodopa On Eeg Connectivity In Parkinson's Patients, Sepehr Torab Parhiz

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Levodopa is a dopamine replacement medication administered to patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) to alleviate their motor symptoms. However, its long-term use can cause adverse side effects, including involuntary motor movements. We studied 16 PD patients before and after taking Levodopa based on resting-state electroencephalography (EEG) recordings to determine how Levodopa affects the functional connectivity of their brain networks. We used several metrics from graph theory, in particular the minimum spanning tree (MST) metric, and analyzed how they change after subjects take Levodopa. We observed significant changes in the lower alpha band toward a more path-like and less globally efficient …

A Wearable Mechatronic Device For Hand Tremor Monitoring And Suppression: Development And Evaluation, Yue Zhou

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Tremor, one of the most disabling symptoms of Parkinson's disease (PD), significantly affects the quality of life of the individuals who suffer from it. These people live with difficulties with fine motor tasks, such as eating and writing, and suffer from social embarrassment. Traditional medicines are often ineffective, and surgery is highly invasive and risky. The emergence of wearable technology facilitates an externally worn mechatronic tremor suppression device as a potential alternative approach for tremor management. However, no device has been developed for the suppression of finger tremor that has been validated on a human.

It has been reported in …