Combined Reactive and Volitional Step Training Improves Balance Recovery and Stepping Reaction Time in People With Parkinson’s Disease: A Randomised Controlled Trial

Background Falls are frequent and devastating events for people with Parkinson’s disease (PD). Here, we investigated whether laboratory-based reactive step training combined with home-based volitional step training was effective in improving balance recovery and stepping ability in people with PD. Methods Forty-four people with idiopathic PD were randomized into intervention or control groups. Intervention participants performed unsupervised volitional step training using home-based exergames (80+ minutes/week) for 12 weeks and attended reactive step training sessions in which they were exposed to slip and trip perturbations at 4 and 8 weeks. Control participants continued their usual activities. Primary outcomes were balance recovery following an induced-trip/slip and choice stepping reaction time (CSRT) at the 12-week reassessment. Secondary outcomes comprised sensorimotor, balance, cognitive, psychological, complex stepping (inhibitory CSRT and Stroop Stepping Test [SST]), gait measures, and falls experienced in everyday life. Results At reassessment, the intervention group had significantly fewer total laboratory-induced falls and faster CSRT compared to the control group ( P < .05). The intervention group also had significantly faster inhibitory CSRT and SST movement times and made fewer mistakes in the SST ( P < .05). There were no significant differences in the rate of every day falls or other secondary outcome measures between the groups. Conclusion Combined volitional and reactive step training improved balance recovery from an induced-perturbation, voluntary stepping time, and stepping accuracy in cognitively challenging tests in people with PD. Further research is required to determine whether such combined step training can prevent daily-life falls in this population.