The Beneficial Effects of Conventional Visual Cues Are Retained When Augmented Reality Glasses Are Worn

Sabine Janssen; Jaap de Ruyter van Steveninck; Hizirwan S Salim; Bastiaan R Bloem; Tjitske Heida; Richard J A van Wezel

doi:10.1155/2020/4104712

The Beneficial Effects of Conventional Visual Cues Are Retained When Augmented Reality Glasses Are Worn

Parkinsons Dis. 2020 Apr 7:2020:4104712. doi: 10.1155/2020/4104712. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Sabine Janssen^{1

2}, Jaap de Ruyter van Steveninck³, Hizirwan S Salim¹, Bastiaan R Bloem², Tjitske Heida¹, Richard J A van Wezel^{1

3}

Affiliations

¹ Biomedical Signals and Systems Group, MIRA Institute for Biomedical Technology and Technical Medicine, University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands.
² Radboud University Medical Centre, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Department of Neurology, Centre of Expertise for Parkinson & Movement Disorders, Nijmegen, Netherlands.
³ Department of Biophysics, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands.

Abstract

Wearing smart glasses may be distracting and thus annihilate the beneficial effects of cues on freezing of gait in Parkinson's disease. Furthermore, augmented reality cues might be effective in reducing FOG specifically in cueing-responsive patients. We present a single-patient study in which a patient with Parkinson's disease traversed a doorway under different cueing conditions. Wearing augmented reality (AR) glasses did not deteriorate FOG nor affect the beneficial effects of cues. The AR visual cues did not improve FOG. This single-patient study implies that the current design of AR glasses does not stand in the way of the development of augmented reality visual cues. However, the effectivity of augmented reality visual cues remains to be proven.