Computerized Simple Reaction Time and Balance in Nondemented Parkinson's Patients.

Background: Parkinson's disease (PD) patients are known to suffer from subtle cognitive and balance deficits from the early stages although they usually manifest in advanced stages. Postural instability (PI) has been correlated with slower information processing speed. Simple reaction time (SRT) tasks can be used to measure the speed of information processing. The main objective of this study was to examine the usefulness of SRT as a valid predictor of balance in PD, thus providing a simple and complementary assessment method.

Methods: This cross-sectional study included 52 PD patients without dementia who were evaluated for balance using the pull test (PT) maneuver and Biodex® limits of stability (LOS). In addition, a reaction time task was used to measure processing speed. Correlation and linear regression analyses were performed.

Results: The performance of SRT tasks was correlated with the evaluation of LOS% and PT, suggesting that the SRT may be a predictor of balance performance. Longer reaction time and poorer postural stability were also associated with disease duration but not with age.

Conclusions: Poor performance in a simple reaction task can predict altered PI and can complement staging and evaluation in PD patients.