Movement Disorders and Smart Wrist Devices: A Comprehensive Study

Abstract

In the medical field, there are several very different movement disorders, such as tremors, Parkinson's disease, or Huntington's disease. A wide range of motor and non-motor symptoms characterizes them. It is evident that in the modern era, the use of smart wrist devices, such as smartwatches, wristbands, and smart bracelets is spreading among all categories of people. This diffusion is justified by the limited costs, ease of use, and less invasiveness (and consequently greater acceptability) than other types of sensors used for health status monitoring. This systematic review aims to synthesize research studies using smart wrist devices for a specific class of movement disorders. Following PRISMA-S guidelines, 130 studies were selected and analyzed. For each selected study, information is provided relating to the smartwatch/wristband/bracelet model used (whether it is commercial or not), the number of end-users involved in the experimentation stage, and finally the characteristics of the benchmark dataset possibly used for testing. Moreover, some articles also reported the type of raw data extracted from the smart wrist device, the implemented designed algorithmic pipeline, and the data classification methodology. It turned out that most of the studies have been published in the last ten years, showing a growing interest in the scientific community. The selected articles mainly investigate the relationship between smart wrist devices and Parkinson's disease. Epilepsy and seizure detection are also research topics of interest, while there are few papers analyzing gait disorders, Huntington's Disease, ataxia, or Tourette Syndrome. However, the results of this review highlight the difficulties still present in the use of the smartwatch/wristband/bracelet for the identified categories of movement disorders, despite the advantages these technologies could bring in the dissemination of low-cost solutions usable directly within living environments and without the need for caregivers or medical personnel.

Keywords: Huntington’s disease; Parkinson’s disease; Tourette Syndrome; ataxia; bracelet; epilepsy; essential tremor; gait disorders; movement disorders; review; seizure detection; smartwatch; tremors; unilateral cerebral palsy; wrist-worn; wristband.

Figure 1

Main functionalities (already or being integrated) for smart wrist devices in the market.

Figure 2

Classification of movement disorders with an approximate indication of worldwide incidence.

Figure 3

Flow diagram generated with PRISMA-S methodology, depicting the reviewers’ process of finding published data on the considered topic and how they decided whether to include it in the review.

Figure 4

Distribution of the articles by year of publication.

Figure 5

Distribution of the articles by movement disorder.

Figure 6

Categorization of the articles related to PD movement disorder.

Figure 7

Categorization of articles related to epilepsy or seizure detection, based on type of wrist device.

Figure 8

Graphical representation of the distribution of articles with respect to classification methodologies.