The clinical assessment of Parkinson’s disease (PD) symptoms can present reliability issues and, with visits typically spaced apart 6 months, can hardly capture their frequent variability. Smartphones and smartwatches along with signal processing and machine learning can facilitate frequent, remote, reliable and objective assessments of PD from patients’ homes.

To investigate the feasibility, compliance and user experience of passively and actively measuring symptoms from home environments using data from sensors embedded in smartphones and a wrist-wearable device.

In an ongoing clinical feasibility study, participants with a confirmed PD diagnosis are being recruited. Participants perform activity tests, including Timed Up and Go (TUG), tremor, finger tapping, drawing and vocalisation, once a week for 2 months using the Mobistudy smartphone app in their homes. Concurrently, participants wear the GENEActiv wrist device for 28 days to measure actigraphy continuously. In addition to using sensors, participants complete the Beck’s Depression Inventory, Non-Motor Symptoms Questionnaire (NMSQuest) and Parkinson’s Disease Questionnaire (PDQ-8) questionnaires at baseline, at 1 month and at the end of the study. Sleep disorders are assessed through the Parkinson’s Disease Sleep Scale-2 questionnaire (weekly) and a custom sleep quality daily questionnaire. User experience questionnaires, Technology Acceptance Model and User Version of the Mobile Application Rating Scale, are delivered at 1 month. Clinical assessment (Movement Disorder Society-Unified Parkinson Disease Rating Scale (MDS-UPDRS)) is performed at enrollment and the 2-month follow-up visit. During visits, a TUG test is performed using the smartphone and the G-Walk motion sensor as reference device. Signal processing and machine learning techniques will be employed to analyse the data collected from Mobistudy app and the GENEActiv and correlate them with the MDS-UPDRS. Compliance and user aspects will be informing the long-term feasibility.

The study received ethical approval by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority (Etikprövningsmyndigheten), with application number 2022-02885-01. Results will be reported in peer-reviewed journals and conferences. Results will be shared with the study participants.

Preoperative anxiety is a frequent problem that can lead to complications both during anaesthesia and in the postoperative period, especially in oncology. Studies have shown that it can be managed using non-pharmacological approaches, but few works have evaluated psychoeducational programmes. The aim of the COHErence Cardiaque (COHEC) II Study is to evaluate the combination of medical hypnosis (MH) and cardiac coherence (CC) training to manage preoperative anxiety in patients with cancer.

COHEC II is an ongoing multicentre randomised clinical trial carried out in three French comprehensive cancer centres. In total, 296 patients who will undergo surgery for cancer will be recruited during 18 months and will be randomised in the control arm or the intervention arm. Patients in the intervention arm will follow a daily programme that combines MH and CC, starting 7 days before surgery. The control arm will receive the standard treatment to manage preoperative anxiety. The primary endpoint is the anxiety level on surgery day, measured using a Visual Analogue Scale. Secondary endpoints are patient adherence to the programme, satisfaction and postsurgery recovery quality.

The study protocol was approved by the French Ethics Committee (Comité de Protection des Personnes EST-II) on 24 November 2021 and will be carried out following the good practice guidelines and the Declaration of Helsinki. Results will be published in peer-reviewed journals and presented at conferences.

NCT05197972.