Does Nordic Walking restore the temporal organization of gait variability in Parkinson’s disease?

Table 2 Absolute mean values of the stride duration variability and spatiotemporal gait variables for the comparison between the usual walking (UW) and the Nordic walking (NW) sessions in Parkinson’s disease and healthy controls and analysis of the (Pathological x Walking conditions) interaction for the stride duration variability and spatiotemporal gait variables

	Parkinson’s disease		Healthy controls		Interaction
	UW	NW	UW	NW	p-value	η ² _p
Stride duration variability
Temporal organization
H exponent	0.70 (±0.05)	0.77 (±0.08)***	0.80 (±0.09)^§§	0.81 (±0.08)	0.012	0.252
α exponent	0.39 (±0.12)	0.56 (±0.19)**	0.56 (±0.22)^§	0.52 (±0.14)	0.002	0.346
Magnitude
CV (%)	2.26 (±0.66)	3.59 (±1.11)**	2.17 (±0.82)	2.92 (±0.91)*	0.255	0.058
Spatiotemporal gait variables
Gait speed (m/s)	1.18 (±0.19)	1.26 (±0.24)	1.47 (±0.17)	1.59 (±0.14)**	0.468	0.025
Gait cadence (#steps/min)	112.90 (±9.48)	102.83 (±13.16)^**	119.22 (±4.55)	117.15 (±5.47)*	0.063	0.155
Step length (m)	0.63 (±0.09)	0.73 (±0.09)***	0.74 (±0.09)	0.81 (±0.08)**	0.370	0.038

Absolute value is expressed as mean (± SD)
***: p ≤ 0.001; **p ≤ 0.01; *p ≤ 0.05 for the comparison between UW and NW (paired t-test)
§§§: p ≤ 0.001; §§ p ≤ 0.01; § p ≤ 0.05 for the comparison of walking conditions between PD and healthy controls (independent t-test)
Bold data indicates if (pathological x walking condition) interaction was significant (p < 0.05)
η ² _p: partial eta squared

ISSN: 1743-0003