BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article
Front. Aging Neurosci.
Sec. Neurocognitive Aging and Behavior
Volume 17 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2025.1569582
This article is part of the Research TopicThe early detection of neurodegenerative diseases: an aging perspectiveView all 5 articles
Detecting the Fractal Physical Activity Pattern in Aged Adults with Cerebral Small Vessel Disease
Provisionally accepted
- 1984th Hospital of the People's Liberation Army, Beijing, China
- 2Seventh Medical Center of PLA General Hospital, Beijing, China
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Background: Actigraphy is widely used to detect a decline in physical activity in aged individuals with cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD). Disturbed fractal physical activity has been reported in aged adults with Alzheimer's disease (AD), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and other neuropsychiatric disorders.Objectives: To analyze the fractal physical activity pattern in elderly patients with cSVD.Methods: From May 2021 to August 2023, 55 patients with cSVD aged 60-80 years admitted to the seventh medical center of PLA General Hospital were included. The presence of lacunes, white matter hyperintensities, cerebral microbleeds, and perivascular spaces on magnetic resonance images (MRI) were rated independently. Furthermore, these MRI markers were summed in a score of 0-4, representing all cSVD features combined. Detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) was used to evaluate the fractal physical activity fluctuations at multiple time scales. The relationship between the fractal physical activity pattern and physical activity and sleep quality was analyzed with partial Pearson correlation analysis.Results: Individuals with a low severity cSVD burden showed a significant tendency toward a random fractal pattern relative to those with a higher severity cSVD burden. Similar results were obtained when comparing the lacune positive and negative groups. In aged adults with cSVD, fractal disturbance was associated with an average level of physical activity and not sleep quality.These findings demonstrate the presence of obvious fractal physical activity complexity in aged adults with cSVD.
Keywords: Actigraphy, Aging, small vessel disease, neurodegenerative disease, wearable
Received: 01 Feb 2025; Accepted: 04 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zhào, Wei, Lv, Shen and Huang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Hóngyi Zhào, 984th Hospital of the People's Liberation Army, Beijing, China
Yonghua Huang, Seventh Medical Center of PLA General Hospital, Beijing, China
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