Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Graphics Research IGD
This interactive app for Parkinson’s facilitates understanding of the disease’s symptoms and course. It makes it possible to assess the risks in individual cases, supports decisions on therapies, and helps patients consciously adjust their lifestyles as appropriate.
Support for medical decision-making
The Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Graphics Research IGD has developed the Parkinson’s Monitor to support decision-making by medical personnel while supplementing their own personal experience with a data-based approach. It enables them to use AI-based analyses to predict the course of the disease more accurately and adjust treatment accordingly. At the same time, the Parkinson’s Monitor helps patients understand their own disease better.
The Parkinson’s Monitor is also aimed at predicting how changes in the medications used will affect the course of the disease. It is intended to reveal which primary symptoms worsen when doses are reduced and which medications are acceptable for mitigating symptoms.
Identification of correlations
The Parkinson’s Monitor captures hundreds of different parameters. Fraunhofer IGD has developed dashboards that enable those providing treatment to keep an overview despite the large data volumes involved. For this purpose, the solution selects past cases that are similar to those of current patients. The Parkinson’s Monitor also combines the data and identifies correlations. The development team used actual data from Parkinson’s Progress Markers to train the solution. The Web application combines a patient diary, image data, and time series.
The German National Research Center for Applied Cybersecurity (ATHENE) ensures security and data protection in connection with use of the application.
Visualization of disease progressions
The Parkinson’s Monitor supports both patients and medical personnel. Visualizations and explanations of the disease’s trajectory gives patients a better overview of how Parkinson’s is developing in them and enables them to make their own decisions, for example on adjusting their lifestyle. The Parkinson’ Monitor also delivers valuable insights for caregivers.
In the next step, the solution will be tested on an actual group of patients in cooperation with a clinical partner to obtain feedback on its user-friendliness.
