Long-term treatment with transcranial pulsed electromagnetic fields improves movement speed and elevates cerebrospinal erythropoietin in Parkinson's disease.

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BackgroundParkinson's disease is characterized by motor dysfunctions including bradykinesia. In a recent study, eight weeks of daily transcranial stimulation with bipolar pulsed electromagnetic fields improved functional rate of force development and decreased inter-hand tremor coherence in patients with mild Parkinson's disease.ObjectiveTo investigate the effect of long-term treatment with transcranial bipolar pulsed electromagnetic fields on motor performance in terms of movement speed and on neurotrophic and angiogenic factors.MethodsPatients diagnosed with idiopathic Parkinson's disease had either daily 30-min treatment with bipolar (±50 V) transcranial pulsed electromagnetic stimulation (squared pulses, 3ms duration) for three eight-week periods separated by one-week pauses (T-PEMF group) (n = 16) or were included in a PD-control group (n = 8). Movement speed was assessed in a six-cycle sit-to-stand task performed on a force plate. Cerebrospinal fluid and venous blood were collected and analyzed for erythropoietin and vascular endothelial growth factor.ResultsMajor significant improvement of movement speed compared to the natural development of the disease was found (p = 0.001). Thus, task completion time decreased gradually during the treatment period from 10.10s to 8.23s (pConclusionLong-term treatment with transcranial bipolar pulsed electromagnetic fields increased movement speed markedly and elevated erythropoietin levels. We hypothesize that treatment with transcranial bipolar pulsed electromagnetic fields improved functional performance by increasing dopamine levels in the brain, possibly through erythropoietin induced neural repair and/or protection of dopaminergic neurons.

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