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. 2023 Mar 23;23(7):3396.
doi: 10.3390/s23073396.

Mobile App Interventions for Parkinson's Disease, Multiple Sclerosis and Stroke: A Systematic Literature Review

Andreas Triantafyllidis  1 , Sofia Segkouli  1 , Stelios Zygouris  1   2 , Christina Michailidou  3 , Konstantinos Avgerinakis  3 , Evangelia Fappa  4 , Sophia Vassiliades  4 , Anastasia Bougea  5 , Nikos Papagiannakis  5 , Ioannis Katakis  6 , Evangelos Mathioudis  6 , Alexandru Sorici  7 , Lidia Bajenaru  7 , Valentina Tageo  8 , Francesco Camonita  8 , Christoniki Magga-Nteve  1 , Stefanos Vrochidis  1 , Ludovico Pedullà  9 , Giampaolo Brichetto  9 , Panagiotis Tsakanikas  10 , Konstantinos Votis  1 , Dimitrios Tzovaras  1
Affiliations

Mobile App Interventions for Parkinson's Disease, Multiple Sclerosis and Stroke: A Systematic Literature Review

Andreas Triantafyllidis et al. Sensors (Basel). .

Abstract

Central nervous system diseases (CNSDs) lead to significant disability worldwide. Mobile app interventions have recently shown the potential to facilitate monitoring and medical management of patients with CNSDs. In this direction, the characteristics of the mobile apps used in research studies and their level of clinical effectiveness need to be explored in order to advance the multidisciplinary research required in the field of mobile app interventions for CNSDs. A systematic review of mobile app interventions for three major CNSDs, i.e., Parkinson's disease (PD), multiple sclerosis (MS), and stroke, which impose significant burden on people and health care systems around the globe, is presented. A literature search in the bibliographic databases of PubMed and Scopus was performed. Identified studies were assessed in terms of quality, and synthesized according to target disease, mobile app characteristics, study design and outcomes. Overall, 21 studies were included in the review. A total of 3 studies targeted PD (14%), 4 studies targeted MS (19%), and 14 studies targeted stroke (67%). Most studies presented a weak-to-moderate methodological quality. Study samples were small, with 15 studies (71%) including less than 50 participants, and only 4 studies (19%) reporting a study duration of 6 months or more. The majority of the mobile apps focused on exercise and physical rehabilitation. In total, 16 studies (76%) reported positive outcomes related to physical activity and motor function, cognition, quality of life, and education, whereas 5 studies (24%) clearly reported no difference compared to usual care. Mobile app interventions are promising to improve outcomes concerning patient's physical activity, motor ability, cognition, quality of life and education for patients with PD, MS, and Stroke. However, rigorous studies are required to demonstrate robust evidence of their clinical effectiveness.

Keywords: Parkinson’s disease; mobile apps; multiple sclerosis; neurological diseases; review; stroke.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Prisma flow diagram for study inclusion.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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