Vestibular stimulation: a noninvasive brain stimulation in Parkinson's disease & its implications

Parkinson's disease (PD) is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder after Alzheimer's disease, and it is characterized by both motor and neuropsychiatric problems. Effective treatment of PD requires a combination of pharmacotherapy and physiotherapy; however, existing treatment generally involves one medical discipline most probably interpretation by neurologist. This pharmacotherapy relay on dopaminergic medications which is not capable of bringing sufficient alleviation of all motor symptoms in PD. Implementing positive lifestyle activities can support patients to improve the quality of life, symptoms, and possibly slow down the disease progression. In far effective management of PD, clinics are trying to execute and promote the use of additional integrative approaches of care among PD patients. Notably, vestibular stimulation like noisy galvanic vestibular stimulation (nGVS) is being studied as a potential treatment for PD, and a number of studies have presented scientific evidence in support of this concept. In this review paper, we highlight the importance of vestibular stimulation in both human and animal studies as one of the promising interventional approaches for PD. All the existing studies are heterogeneous in study design, so further studies have to be conducted which meets the standards of randomized control trial with proper sample size to validate the findings of vestibular stimulation.