The Digital Biomarkers Development, Validation, and Verification (dBM-DEV) study is now fully underway, with patient recruitment initiated at all clinical sites: CHU de Toulouse in France, King’s College London in the UK, Fundación INCE (Iniciativa para las Neurociencias) in Spain, and Technical University of Dresden in Germany.

As a part of the AI-PROGNOSIS project, this study focuses on developing digital biomarkers (dBMs) to track Parkinson’s disease (PD) symptoms, particularly REM sleep behaviour disorder (RBD) and daytime sleepiness.

Importance of the Study

REM behaviour disorder (RBD) is the best predictor for neurodegenerative diseases with synuclein pathology, including Parkinson’s disease. RBD affects 0.5-1% of the general population. It can only be diagnosed by polysomnography, which is a cumbersome procedure that cannot be used for screening. An RBD screening questionnaire (RBDSQ) has been developed with high sensitivity but low specificity. Thus, digital assessments can potentially be used to identify people with a high probability of RBD for polysomnography to facilitate the detection of prodromal PD.

The dBM-DEV study will involve 90 participants across Germany, France, Spain, and the UK, who will undergo daily-life digital biomarker tracking.

It is anticipated that identifying robust dBMs in this study will have a favourable impact on the PD community by enabling the daily detection and monitoring of PD symptoms, including early signs of a disease like RBD.

This milestone brings us closer to advancing our research and deepening our understanding of Parkinson’s disease.