In the RTL “Pisa – De Wëssensmagazin” broadcast of 29 November 2015 on the topic “Big Data”, Prof. Dr. Rejko Krüger introduced the new mPOWER app for mobile phones, which has been recently developed by Sage Bionetworks in the US.
The German and French versions of the app have been developed specifically for the Luxembourg Parkinson’s Study and address to Parkinson’s patients and doctors alike. The program allows patients to measure symptoms daily on their phone, store the results and analyse them over time. Such data, recorded by the patient at home in his daily life, will be analysed anonymously within the study and can make an important contribution to understanding Parkinson’s disease.
“On average, we see the patients once a year for the study. With the new app, the patient can also record symptoms in detail between the visits such that we can better judge the course of the disease“, says Prof. Rejko Krüger, coordinator of the Luxembourg Parkinson’s study of the NCER-PD research programme.
In the app, patients can for instance measure their dexterity through „finger tapping“, in which they touch the display of the mobile phone alternating index and middle finger as fast as possible, In addition, the app can measure slight deviations in voice or gait with a precision, that hasn’t been accessible to the doctor before. This way one can easily measure the most important symptoms in a few minutes per day.
The NCER-PD research programme investigates how such details can be used to improve the diagnosis and treatment of Parkinson’s patients. All participations are free to share their data from the app with their treating physician. At the moment, the mPOWER app is already available in Luxembourg for participants of the NCER-PD Parkinson’s study on the iphone. For questions about participation or usage of the app, please contact the secretariat of the Parkinson’s research clinic at the CHL.