Affiliations: [a]
Department of Psychiatry, University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics, Iowa City, IA, USA
| [b]
George Huntington Institute, Muenster, Germany
| [c]
Department of Radiology, University of Muenster, Muenster, Germany
| [d]
Department of Neurodegenerative Diseases and Hertie-Institute for Clinical Brain Research, University of Tuebingen, Tuebingen, Germany
Correspondence:
[*]
Correspondence to: Ellen van der Plas, PhD, W280 GH, 200 Hawkins Drive, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA. Tel.: +1 319 353 8544; E-mail: ellen-vanderplas@uiowa.edu.
Abstract: Q-Motor is utilized across various clinical trials in adults with Huntington’s disease (HD) to provide quantitative, reliable assessments of motor abilities. With gene-knockdown therapies entering the clinic, development of preventative therapies for pediatric carriers of the HD mutation seems imminent. It is currently unclear if Q-Motor is useful for tracking changes in motor abilities in pediatric HD patients or at-risk youth, as most assessments have never been administered in children. We demonstrate the feasibility of administering Q-Motor tasks in a sample of children recruited from the community, and we show that Q-Motor is sensitive to age-related changes in motor abilities.
