Abstract

VIEIRA, Gisele de Paula et al. Virtual reality in physical rehabilitation of patients with Parkinson's disease. Rev. bras. crescimento desenvolv. hum. [online]. 2014, vol.24, n.1, pp. 31-41. ISSN 0104-1282.

INTRODUCTION: The Virtual Reality (VR) can be a therapeutic tool used in neurorehabilitation field. It is considered a ludic activity that provides visual and auditory feedbacks, facilitating the patients' adherence to treatment. AIMS: To perform literature review about influences of VR in rehabilitation of patients with Parkinson's disease. METHODS: Data banks were used from the following virtual libraries: Medline, PEDro, Lilacs, Scielo and PubMed using the following keywords: Parkinson's disease and Virtual Reality; Parkinson's disease and Wii as well as analogous keywords in Spanish and Portuguese to obtain the scientific papers. PEDro scale was used to analyze the methodological quality of the papers. RESULTS: From fifty papers obtained after inclusion and exclusion criteria were retained 16 papers to analyses. According to PEDro scale most of the papers had low score. The results suggest that VR shows positive aspects in velocity and movement time, balance, gait, postural control and functionality of upper extremities. The ludic activity provided by VR and the contribution of visual and auditory feedbacks of this intervention can be the great potential of this new tool. CONCLUSION: The VR is useful to make potent: motor control, functionality, cognitive capacity and balance, but still need more scientific studies with methodological qualities to confirm the results of the VR in Parkinson's disease.

Keywords : Parkinson's disease; physical therapy (modalities); video game; rehabilitation.

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