Using focused ultrasound to investigate the brain’s effect on balance and walking in Parkinson’s.

People with Parkinson’s experience a range of movement difficulties in their daily lives, including tremor, stiffness, balance and walking impairments.

Medications are effective for tremor and stiffness, but they do not improve balance and walking well. These symptoms are identified by people with Parkinson’s as the most disabling.

Importantly, balance and walking deficits increase the likelihood of falls, which are one of the most frequent reasons for hospitalisation and loss in independence in Parkinson’s.

Why funding is needed

£120,000 will help fund the technology needed to identify these new treatments.

Any contribution, big or small, will make a significant difference and help us reach our goal.

How we could help develop treatments for impaired balance and walking

The primary reason that we do not yet have effective treatments for balance and walking impairments is that we do not understand which brain circuits are involved. We therefore do not know how to develop new treatment that could modify the relevant brain regions.

However, a new technique that uses focused ultrasound is now available. It can be used to stimulate or inhibit different brain regions safely, meaning we can investigate whether modulating different brain regions might be helpful for improving balance and walking.

We use state-of-the-art motion capture along with advanced neuroimaging in our research. We have begun to understand how Parkinson’s-related degeneration contributes to balance and walking impairments.

We hope to combine these methods with focused ultrasound of the brain to identify which brain regions can be targeted for new treatments.

Importantly, we believe that deep brain stimulation of the brain (which is already effective for tremor and stiffness) could be modified for balance and walking, and that focused ultrasound will help us develop this new treatment strategy.