Limitations and future study
PD, tremor
DISEASE
Our proposed early-stage PD and ET classification model (LOOCV accuracy: 84%, independent test accuracy: 75.8%) is good with proven feasibility and potential to differentiate early-stage PD from ET, but it is not outstanding. Some limitations and future extension need to be considered to make the current study better. First, there are individual differences in gait and postural parameters even in participants who have the same disease. To better represent the population data, future research should include more participants to make the samples more representative and the research more reliable and accurate. Second, in addition to the basic models SVM and RF, other models should also be taken into consideration, which may make the classification framework more accurate. Third, the assessments from our current study were all performed in the clinic with a gait quantitative evaluation system. It is affordable and readily available for the clinic; however, it may not be suitable for personal use at home. In addition to gait parameters obtained from a short and standard test such as the TUG test in the clinic, future work is required to extend this approach to real-world gait assessments with more flexible devices and continuous monitoring and compare it with our current classification framework. Fourth, in addition to gait features, other measurements, such as the measurement of hand tremor variation acquired through tremor signal analysis from rest, postural and kinetic tasks [