Has Parkinson’s Disease Stolen Your Balance?

Now there’s a non-invasive, high-tech solution that actually helps rewire your brain bypassing disease-damaged areas giving Parkinson’s disease patients the ability to walk normally again.

And it’s available without a prescription.

I know you’ve heard these kinds of promises before only to be let down when improvement didn’t happen. Or worse yet, you improved for a few months and then started falling back to where you were.

So why should things be any different now?

Because a new high-tech virtual reality device recently developed by MIT-educated Computer Science Professor Yoram Baram PhD. in Israel has already given Parkinson’s disease patients better balance and the ability to walk normally again.

It’s easy to use at home, doesn’t require any special training or supervision, and doesn’t interfere with any other treatments you may already be involved in.

Better yet, you control when, where, and how long you use this device, not your physical therapist or doctor. This gives you much more control over your day enhancing your quality of life at the same time.

As little as 20 minutes a day rewires the walking circuits in your brain

Your brain rewires itself through a natural process known as neuroplasticity.

In the last 30 years, great strides have been made in our ability to understand how the human brain works and its ability to repair itself. Yes, it’s now a proven fact that your brain can and does repair itself if given the right type of input.
Good nutrition certainly plays an important role. But more importantly, some physical activity jump-starts the rewiring process. That’s why your doctor may have prescribed physical therapy as part of your treatment regimen. In your case though it simply means going for a 20-minute walk.

Introducing the GaitAid Virtual Walker

Here’s where this new device called the GaitAid Virtual Walker comes in. This device helps you literally rewire your own brain naturally without the use of drugs or surgery. In fact, it’s totally non-invasive and doesn’t require a prescription from your doctor.

Its only side effect is better balance.

Simply wear the device and go for a walk in a safe area. By using the visual cues and audio feedback the device gives you, your brain begins creating new healthy circuits literally bypassing disease-damaged areas. In as little as two weeks, your brain can respond to the teaching beginning the bypass process. In some cases patients have begun showing improvement during the first session.

By using your own body’s natural ability to repair itself, you’re sort of slipping through your brain’s back door unnoticed. The practice sessions help your body ignore the disease that damaged your ability to walk in the first place giving you the gift of better balance and a more normal walking gait. Your brain utilizes a similar process it used when you first learned to walk as a toddler.

Use neuroplasticity to rewire your own brain

Toddlers learn to walk by trial and error using exaggerated motions. At first, they lift their legs too high holding their arms over their head for balance. They concentrate really hard trying not to fall. Not so unlike people suffering from movement disorders. Toddlers struggle and struggle to learn how to walk while we look on with a mixture of amusement and trepidation. It’s funny to watch but at the same time we worry they’ll fall and hurt themselves.

A friend of mine told a story of how his daughter fell onto the edge of the coffee table in the family room while first learning to walk. She hit the edge of the table with her mouth wide open splitting her upper gums. Although she cried hard in his arms for a few minutes, she was up and around trying to walk in no time. It wasn’t long before she was toddling all over the room holding her arms up for balance. In just another week she was trying to run. Her brain had now developed healthy walking circuits enabling her to walk upright safely.

This story illustrates how you can use neuroplasticity to rewire your own brain the same way my friend’s daughter did. By the way, hitting the table with her gums turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Because she was also teething and her top front teeth were about to erupt, they now came in quickly because of the cut on her gums.

Why don’t conventional medical treatments always help as much as we think they should?

Two reasons.

First…when faced with a patient suffering from a chronic medical condition like Parkinson’s disease, most doctors’ reach for the prescription pad first. Sometimes the drugs they prescribe seem to work miracles. And sometimes they don’t help at all. Either way, the potential side effects can cause problems of their own.

Second…the basic structure of our healthcare system gets in the way. By its very nature, our healthcare system requires you to go to them.

Besides drugs, another type of treatment many doctors prescribe is physical therapy.

If done right, physical therapy can help you make great improvements in your ability to walk safely. It requires a properly trained physical therapist that really understands your underlying disease factors.

Unfortunately, physical therapy has three distinct disadvantages…

• It’s expensive…even with insurance it turns into $200 to $300 a month in a hurry.

• It can only be done inside the therapist’s office…meaning you need to drive or get a ride to get there.

• And the therapist probably won’t have a tiled floor…which is one of the few effective tools they could use to actually help you with your gait impairment.

Why Parkinson’s patients lose their balance

Neurological disorders like Parkinson’s cause motor and visual impairments. In fact, gait impairment has become one of the main complaints from advanced Parkinson’s disease patients. These patients often walk slowly with shuffling and dragging steps, reduced stride length, a stooped posture and diminished arm swing. Not only do people with these disorders suffer from distorted visual feedback, they actually are more dependent on good feedback than healthy people in order to walk without freezing and stumbling.

The average person uses what they see to maintain their balance, step off curbs, step over thresholds, and to avoid all the other obstacles and hazards normally encountered while walking. Because people with movement disorders don’t always transfer and process what they see to their brain properly, they tend to lose their balance, stumble, and even fall down.

Tiles on the floor offer a partial solution

Clinical studies using black and white tiles on the floor have been shown to reduce and even eliminate “freezing” while increasing stability during walking. This freezing condition is prevalent in Parkinson’s patients. Although the tile phenomenon was first discovered in Parkinson’s patients, subsequent studies have shown MS patients and other movement disorders are also helped when walking on tiles.

A doctor named Oliver Sacks discovered the positive effect of walking on tiles in the 1960s while doing research on the drug l-DOPA. Sacks documented this in his book, Awakenings, which became a major feature film staring Robert De Niro and Robin Williams.

For more information on the subject of walking on tiles, you may read some of the clinical studies found at the clinical studies tab on this website.

How virtual reality helps people walk better

The Virtual Walker helps in two ways.

One, it displays virtual black and white tiles visible in front of you. The device does this by displaying them on a set of glasses you wear on your head just like regular eye glasses. Because you can see through these glasses, the images float in front of you and you can see where you are going at the same time.

Two, it generates audio feedback based on your steps and other motions as you walk. The Virtual Walker does this in a way not used in the past. By combining motion detector input from inside the device and sophisticated programming, your own walking motion generates audio tones that you hear on the built-in headphones. These tones stimulate you to alter your walking motion in a subtle way. As you get used to the device, you naturally want to make the audio cues more rhythmic. This is a natural response to the device.

Scientists call this type of biofeedback “closed loop” feedback. It’s called “closed loop” because it’s generated by the your own motions. By combining these two types of cues with closed loop feedback, you train your own brain to help you walk better.

So how does this actually help you to walk better?

First, lets talk about the black and white tiles. Clinical studies using real tiles on the floor have been shown to reduce and even eliminate “freezing” during walking. In 1999, Neural Processing Letters published a paper titled “Walking on Tiles” showing the scientific explanation of how the brain responds to the stimuli provided by the tiles. In 2002, they published another paper “Walking on Virtual Tiles” showing how virtual tiles significantly improved the stability and walking speed of Parkinson’s patients.

PD patients show significant improvement

While not all patients show the same percentage improvement, the patients with the most impairment also showed the most improvement. On average their speed improved by 26% and stride length by 31%.

Both open-loop and closed-loop systems were tested. While the older open-loop system did help, some patients experienced acute dizziness while using the device. The new closed-loop system inside the GaitAid Virtual Walker works significantly better and doesn’t cause dizziness.

Second, lets talk about the audio or “sound” feedback. Alberto J. Espay, MD, of The Neuroscience Institute, Movement Disorders Center, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA performed a study with PD patients. This study resulted with nearly 70% of the patients improving by at least 20% in either walking velocity, stride length, or both. These improvements lasted even after the study ended. Better yet, the early indications show the device to be as effective as medication and surgery without the potential associated risks.

As a result of the various clinical studies, a new device was born.

The Newest Version of a Closed-loop Feedback Device is Now Available.

The GaitAid Virtual Walker...

Everything you’ve just read about the GaitAid Virtual Walker is real. It’s a real breakthrough in the treatment of gait impairment. Tested concepts like walking on tiles and closed-loop audio feedback have been combined into a small portable high-tech device. It’s easy to use and it works.

Ultimately though, it’s not about the technology. It’s about improving your quality of life.

You’re mobility affects your life in so many ways. The average person takes their ability to walk normally for granted. Not so for people living with gait impairment problems.

As your ability to walk improves, your life becomes so much more enjoyable. Instead of struggling to do simple tasks like buying groceries or picking up the newspaper in the driveway, you’ll gain more time in your day to do the things that really matter.

The bottom line

Why would you invest in the GaitAid Virtual Walker? Only two reasons.

1. Because you’ll be able to walk faster with better balance making your day-to-day life safer and more enjoyable.

2. Because you’ll feel better about yourself and your ability to live a more full and independent life.

You can try the GaitAid Virtual Walker for 30 days. If you decide to return the device for any reason within the first 30 days after you receive it, we will refund your complete payment excluding shipping and handling.

Yes. Send me a GaitAid Virtual Walker Now

Regular Option

Purchase $1200

Lease Option

$500 1st Installment
$100 a month for 10 months
For a total of $1500
Return in first 30 days for a full refund (excluding shipping charges)
Return anytime after 30 days and no more charges will apply.

GaitAid Virtual Walker Warranty

The GaitAid Virtual Walker is guaranteed to be free of manufacturing defects for one year. If you have any technical issue we cannot resolve over the phone, we will replace either the entire device or the individual pieces at no charge.