Motor Skill Learning in People With Parkinson's Disease

Completed

Conditions studied: Parkinson's Disease

In brief

This study will compare brain changes in people with Parkinson's disease with those of normal control subjects while they learn motor skills. People with Parkinson's disease sometimes have trouble learning new skills, but it is not known why. This study will use repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), nerve conduction studies, and electroencephaolography (EEG) to look for differences in the way the brain changes with learning in people with Parkinson's disease. Healthy normal volunteers and people with Parkinson's disease who are between 21 and 80 years of age may be eligible for this study. Participants undergo the following procedures in five visits to the NIH Clinical Center: Visit 1 Medical and neurological examination. Visit 2 Motor training. Participants perform a pinching movement once every other second, timed to a metronome, during rTMS. For TMS, a wire coil is held on the subject's scalp. A brief electrical current is passed through the coil, creating a magnetic pulse that stimulates the brain. The subject hears a click and may feel a pulling sensation on the skin under the coil. There may be a twitch in the muscles of the face, arm or leg. rTMS involves repeated magnetic pulses delivered in short bursts of impulses. Visits 3 and 4 Brain physiology studies using rTMS, nerve conduction studies (electrical nerve stimulation) and EEG. A nerve at the subject's wrist is stimulated with electrical impulses to measure the speed with which nerves conduct electrical impulses and the strength of the connection between the nerve and the muscle. rTMS is performed for 20 minutes. The EEG measures the electrical activity of the brain (brain waves). For this test, electrodes (metal discs) are placed on the scalp with a conductive gel and the brain waves are recorded while the subject moves his or her thumb briskly for 20 minutes. Visit 5 Subjects undergo rTMS for 20 minutes and have an EEG. ...

Key facts

Study ID: NCT00396942
Run by: National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
People needed: 24
Starts: 2006-11-02
Expected to finish: 2008-10-03
Last updated by the study team: 2017-07-02

Who can join

Age: 21 and older, up to 80. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: accepted.

You may not qualify if…

Subjects with a history of neurological disorder that might affect cortical plasticity including head injury with loss of consciousness and epilepsy, current use or a history of alcohol or drug abuse, psychiatric disorders requiring hospitalization, or prolonged treatment such as substance abuse addiction
Subjects with dementia; mini mental state examination (MMSE) less than 25, frontal assessment battery (FAB) less than 13
Subjects with other parkinsonian syndromes such as Lewy body disease, corticobasal degeneration, progressive supranuclear palsy, Binswanger disease and multiple system atrophy
Subjects with marked tremor, dyskinesia or sensory disturbance
Subject who have been treated with the subthalamic nucleus stimulation and pallidotomy
Subjects who are unable to refrain from anti-parkinsonian medications for up to 15 hours on study days
Subjects with significant hearing loss
The following exclusion criteria are due to the use of TMS:
Subjects with cardiac pacemakers, intracardiac lines, implanted medication pump
Subjects with blood vessel, cochlear, or eye implants
Subjects with increased intracranial pressure as evaluated by clinical means
Subjects with metal in the cranium
Subjects with dental braces (but dental fillings are okay), metal fragments from occupational exposure or surgical clips in or near the brain

Where it is running

National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, 9000 Rockville Pike — Bethesda, Maryland, United States

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

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