Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is the commonest disabling neurological condition to affect young adults in Ireland. The emergence of new treatments has had a major impact in reducing sudden disease relapses, although it remains unclear whether these treatments reduce patient disability over the long term.
Progressive walking disability may occur gradually over several years in a substantial number of MS patients, and there is currently no clinically useful objective measure to identify progressive motor impairment. The Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) is the gold-standard measure of disability in MS; a significant shortcoming of the EDSS is its limited ability to detect early progression of motor disability. Furthermore, we currently lack objective measures to monitor the effect of treatments on disability progression.
The emergence of wearable health technologies has presented an opportunity to gather objective data on physical activity in the healthy population to monitor day to day exercise output as well as other heath parameters. Wearables are now in widespread use in the general population. However, while wearable technologies are now being used increasingly as activity monitors in several disease states, their application in MS has been limited.
We therefore plan to use a widely available motion sensor in order to monitor physical activity over time in a cohort of MS patients who are undergoing treatment with a potentially disease-modifying therapy.
