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Yui Matsuda finds the connection between research and patient care.

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Nursing school gives Mike Watkins more insight into emergency medicine.

Nearly 60 percent of people with Parkinson’s disease experience the sudden inability to walk, a phenomenon referred to as “freezing of gait.” It manifests in a complete stop or prolonged shuffle despite the individual’s best intentions to move forward. It can be triggered midstride by a cluttered room, narrow spaces like a doorway or when making a turn. No medications or surgeries are able to treat it. A team of five Virginia Commonwealth University researchers — led by Dr. Ingrid Pretzer-Aboff, senior nurse researcher in the School of Nursing, and Dr. Leslie Cloud, neurologist in the Parkinson’s and Movement Disorders Center — have been testing a vibrating device worn just above the shoe that could put an end to the freeze. Their work, which began years ago, has expanded this year with new funding from the National Institutes of Health.