Congratulations to Ka Loong Kelvin Au, MD and Michael S. Okun, MD, on the publication of “Timing of Physical Therapy Sessions for Individuals With Parkinson Disease May Unlock Benefits.” This article was published in the September 12th edition of JAMA Neurology.
Most persons with Parkinson disease (PD) will face increasing mobility deficits, including difficulties with transfers, posture, balance, and walking.1 To mitigate these symptoms, physical therapy (PT) is commonly prescribed in conjunction with pharmacotherapy.1 In many health care systems, a prescription for physical therapy is simply a recommendation for a burst of short-term, closely spaced visits to address a newly developed condition, such as a stroke. Practitioners are usually more concerned with patients accessing the prescribed service than with the timing-based delivery patterns of PT. Timing patterns vary widely by frequency, duration, intensity, and the experience of the therapist.2 There is no current consensus on optimal PT timing in PD and we therefore raise the question, are we missing an opportunity to optimize PT for persons with chronic PD?