Assistant Professor in Biomedical Engineering and Neurosurgery, Dr. Kara Johnson, and her team were awarded a $75K grant from the Digital Health Initiative to conduct a pilot study on patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) to help improve nonmotor symptoms such as depression and apathy.
Individuals with PD often have disabling symptoms that are not related to movement that can have debilitating impacts on their daily lives. While PD movement symptoms symptoms often significantly improve with treatment such as deep brain stimulation (DBS), symptoms such as depression and apathy remain. Johnson and her team found a connection between these nonmotor symptoms and changes in deep brain activity within the basal ganglia, a group of structures inside the center of the brain that controls body movement and physical habits, manages emotions, and makes choices. Johnson’s team identified differing brain rhythms such as high beta and low delta activity that may be associated with depression and apathy severity. This new pilot study titled, “Precision Digital Neuromodulation for Depression and Apathy in Parkinson’s Disease” endeavors to treat psychiatric symptoms in PD while continuing to study the brain network of PD and how it relates to depression symptoms.
The study will consist of 10 PD patients who suffer from depression and/or apathy and have a DBS implant capable of recording brain activity. These individuals will take a base assessment to evaluate the levels of their symptoms. The study will begin by utilizing CoNECCT, a therapeutic video gaming device developed by the University of Utah’s Dr. Sarah Shizuko, to engage neuroplasticity (the ability for the brain to change) in cognitive and motivational networks. The patients will use CoNECCT at home, daily, for six weeks while their DBS implants record changes and patterns in brain activity to track any correlation between the implemented therapy and effects on psychiatric symptoms of PD. This will allow University researchers to collect data identifying biomarkers that could lead to personalized digital treatment for psychiatric symptoms in PD and other brain disorders.
Johnson’s team hypothesizes that CoNECCT will improve nonmotor symptoms of PD and will show an association with reduced beta and increased delta activity. When asked about the intended results of this study and how it will impact future mental health research, Johnson stated, “This research will hopefully shed light on the role of deep brain activity and neuroplasticity in psychiatric symptoms, which could then enable us to develop effective and scalable therapies that complement more invasive neuromodulation therapies like DBS for individuals with PD facing challenging comorbid psychiatric symptoms.”
Congratulations to Kara Johnson and her team: Sarah Shizuko Morimoto (Department of Population Health Sciences), Roger Altizer (Department of Population Health Sciences), Shervin Rahimpour (Department of Neurosurgery), and Conor Flavin (Department of Neurology). The results of this pilot study have the potential to lead to larger research in developing individualized treatment for brain disorders.