Increased foot strike variability in Parkinson's disease patients with freezing of gait

摘要

Introduction: Freezing of gait (FOG) is a debilitating, late motor complication of Parkinson's disease (PD) that occurs in 50-80% of patients. Gait freezing significantly worsens quality of life by decreasing mobility and increasing falls. Studies have shown that patients with episodic freezing episodes also have deficits in continuous gait. We evaluated whether there was an objective gait correlate to the increased stumbling reported by many patients with gait freezing.