Study Rationale: Interest in digital technologies within Parkinson’s disease (sensors, devices, specific smartphone apps) for early detection and disease monitoring has increased in recent years. Over the past decade, there has been enormous growth in the number of commercially available devices, with investment. But despite the increased interest in using digital technologies in clinical research, they have not penetrated clinical care and clinical trials because of the absence of standards and approaches to implementation, lack of a consensus regarding the concepts of interests, lack of appropriate technical and clinical validation for regulatory acceptance. This proposal aims to help close these gaps by providing a meaningful way to sift through the ever-growing options of DHT, to identify the best available tools for the particular clinical or research needs.
Hypothesis: We posit that providing a resource platform, openly available with the most current information on fit-for-purpose applications, will help drive knowledge forward, limiting waste of time and money while standardizing the field.
Study Design: We will perform a literature review of existing digital technologies (both commercially and non-commercially available) used in PD clinical care and clinical research. Information from this search will be implemented in a database platform using an off-the-shelf solution. We will further create a step-wise strategy and plan to transform the library into a registration platform in which researchers and industry will register their solutions to improve visibility and provide evidence for the community.
Impact on Diagnosis/Treatment of Parkinson’s disease: This resource will help researchers/ clinicians/ and clinical trial designers access valuable decision support and provide means for choosing fit-for-purpose tools for a specific concept of interest. It will further help future developers to learn from gathered knowledge and save valuable time and effort.
Next Steps for Development: Sensitive tools for assessing change are a top priority in clinical care and clinical trials. The proposed library will help facilitate standardization and knowledge-based decision.