 |
| New hope for better recovery for patients who survive a debilitating stroke comes in the form of magnets that stimulate the brain. |
There is new hope for better recovery for patients who
survive a debilitating stroke. Italian researchers have discovered that
the use of magnets to stimulate the nerve cells of the brain can help to
correct the condition known as hemispatial neglect, which prevents
stroke patients from seeing or recognizing anything on one side of their
body. The details of the research appear in the journal Neurology.
Previous studies have estimated that between 20 and 50 percent of
patients suffer hemispatial neglect following a stroke. The condition
most often occurs when stroke damaged is suffered in the right half of
the brain.
In a news release, study author Giacomo Koch, MD, Ph.D., of the Santa
Lucia Foundation in Rome, Italy stated, “The treatment is based on the
theory that hemispatial neglect results when a stroke disrupts the
balance between the two hemispheres of the brain. He went on to
explaind, “A stroke on one side of the brain causes the other side to
become overactive, and the circuits become overloaded.”
Currently, treatment for hemispatial neglect combines physical
therapy with brain retraining, which involves performance of mental
tasks via a computer or pen and paper. However, the treatment is often
not effective enough to provide significant improvement.
A new treatment, known as transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS),
uses a sizable magnetic coil placed against the patient’s scalp to
create mild electric currents that stimulate nerve cells, which may have
the ability to restore balance between both sides of the brain.
For their study, Koch and colleagues provided daily TMS treatment for
10 of 20 stroke patients who suffered from hemispatial neglect for a
period of two weeks. The other 10 participants received a faux
treatment, while all of the study subjects took part in brain retraining
treatment.
The study participants underwent testing at the end of the study, and
then again after an additional two weeks, to measure their abilities to
perform daily tasks such as dialing numbers on a phone, reading a menu,
and sorting coins, as well as their abilities of line crossing and
figure-and-shape-copying.
The findings of the analysis showed that overall, those participants
who received TMS had improved by 16.3 percent by the end of treatment,
and improvement increased to 22.6 percent after another two weeks. In
addition, improvement was seen in the overactive brain circuits of
patients who received magnetic treatment. No improvements were noted in
test scores of those who received the sham treatment.
While it is possible for patients to recover without treatment after a
few weeks following a stroke, their progress can be greatly hampered
during the initial weeks of suffering a stroke that are vital to their
overall recovery. Use of TMS can help to prevent such hindrance to
healing, and may help patients to recover better cognitive abilities and
movement.
The researchers noted that the positive results of the study may be
due to the combination of the use of both TMS and brain retraining
treatments. In addition, because the study was small, more research will
be necessary to determine whether TMS is a more effective treatment
than brain retraining.
No comments:
Post a Comment