Application of Telehealth Intervention in Parkinson's Disease: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Introduction  Telehealth intervention has been proposed as a sustainable and innovative intervention approach to Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients, but there are still conflicting results in the literature about its effect. This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of telehealth intervention for PD patients.
Methods  PubMed, EMBASE, CENTRAL and China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) were searched from the inception to June 2018 for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and cohort studies, without language restrictions. When feasible, data were statistically pooled for meta-analysis using Review Manager 5.3. Otherwise, narrative summaries were used.
Results  Twenty-one studies were included. With respect to PD severity, compared with usual care, telehealth intervention was beneficial in lowering motor impairment of PD patients significantly (mean difference (MD) = –2.27, 95% confidence interval (95% CI) −4.25 to −0.29, p = 0.02), rather than mental status (MD = –0.98, 95% CI −2.61 to 0.65, p = 0.24), activities of daily living (MD = –1.51, 95% CI −4.91 to 1.89, p = 0.38) and motor complications (MD = –0.36, 95% CI −1.31 to 0.59, p = 0.46). Telehealth intervention did not lead to significant reduction in quality of life (standardized mean difference (SMD) = 0.04, 95% CI −0.20 to 0.28, p = 0.76), depression (SMD = –0.12, 95% CI −0.37 to 0.13, p = 0.34), cognition (MD = 0.37, 95% CI −0.34 to 1.09, p = 0.31) and balance (MD = 0.09, 95% CI −2.49 to 2.66, p = 0.95).
Discussion  Telehealth intervention is an effective option for individuals with PD to improve their motor impairment. Further well-designed studies are warranted to confirm our findings.