Quantitative Assessment of Cerebella Ataxia through Automated Upper Limb Functional Tests

Abstract

Neurological disorders typically exhibit movement disabilities and disorders such as cerebellar ataxia (CA) can cause coordination inaccuracies often manifested as disabilities associated with gait, balance and speech. Since the severity assessment of the disorder is based on the expert clinical opinion, it is likely to be subjective. Automated versions of two upper limb tests: Finger to Nose test (FNT) and Diadochokinesia (DDK) test are investigated in this paper. Inertial Measurement Units (IMU) (BioKinTM) are employed to capture the disability by measuring limb movements. Translational and rotational accelerations considered as kinematic parameters provided the features relevant to charac..