Virtual Reality Effects on Functional Capacity and Quality of Life of People With Parkinson's Disease

Introduction: Parkinson's disease (PD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder of dopaminergic neurons that can cause some mobility limitations and it has association with quality of life (QOL) in patients with PD. Virtual reality (VR) has been used to treat of these patients Objective: Evaluate the functional capacity and QOL of individuals with PD using VR with X-Box Kinect®. Methods: Were selected 20 individuals classified as stages 1-3, aged 50-75 years. They were divided by lot into two groups (control and experimental) with ten patients in each. The group (CG) treated with exercises (conventional therapy) during five-week, with two sessions per week lasting 60 minutes, while the experimental group (EG) spent half the time with conventional physical therapy and other half of time in virtual rehabilitation (VR). Subjects were evaluated before and after treatment using the following scales: Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale and Parkinson's Disease Questionnaire .

Inclusion Criteria:

• Patients with clinical diagnosis of idiopathic Parkinson's disease
• Male and female
• Stage 1-3 of the Hoehn and Yahr scale.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Have other neurological diseases
• They have decompensated systemic diseases
• Musculoskeletal changes that prevent the achievement of movements
• With lowering of the cognitive level assessed using the MiniMental State examination with cutoff point according to education
• With respiratory impairment
• With medical restrictions for performing exercises
• In physical therapy, occupational therapy service for 3 months or more;