Deans' stroke musings: Neurocognitive effects of multivitamin supplementation on the steady state visually evoked potential (SSVEP) measure of brain activity in elderly women

Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain! trillions and trillions of neurons that DIE each day because there are NO effective hyperacute therapies besides tPA(only 12% effective). I have 523 posts on hyperacute therapy, enough for researchers to spend decades proving them out. These are my personal ideas and blog on stroke rehabilitation and stroke research. Do not attempt any of these without checking with your medical provider. Unless you join me in agitating, when you need these therapies they won't be there.

What this blog is for:

My blog is not to help survivors recover, it is to have the 10 million yearly stroke survivors light fires underneath their doctors, stroke hospitals and stroke researchers to get stroke solved. 100% recovery. The stroke medical world is completely failing at that goal, they don't even have it as a goal. Shortly after getting out of the hospital and getting NO information on the process or protocols of stroke rehabilitation and recovery I started searching on the internet and found that no other survivor received useful information. This is an attempt to cover all stroke rehabilitation information that should be readily available to survivors so they can talk with informed knowledge to their medical staff. It lays out what needs to be done to get stroke survivors closer to 100% recovery. It's quite disgusting that this information is not available from every stroke association and doctors group.

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Neurocognitive effects of multivitamin supplementation on the steady state visually evoked potential (SSVEP) measure of brain activity in elderly women

We as survivors will need better cognition in order to direct our neurogenesis and neuroplasticity efforts. Get your researcher involved in testing this in survivors. You do want to get Smarter After Stroke, don't you? I couldn't resist Peter.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S003193841200282X

Abstract

Objective

Growing evidence suggests that dietary supplementation with selected micronutrients and nutraceuticals may have the potential to improve cognition in older adults. Fewer studies have investigated the effects of these substances on brain activity.

Methods

This study was a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, conducted to explore the effects of 16 weeks supplementation with a combined multivitamin, mineral and herbal formula on the steady state visually evoked potential (SSVEP) measure of brain electrical activity. Participants were elderly women aged between 64 and 79 years, with subjective memory complaints. Baseline and post-treatment SSVEP data was obtained for 22 participants in the multivitamin group and 19 in the placebo group. A spatial working memory delayed response task (DRT) was performed during the recording of the SSVEP.

Results

The results revealed that when compared to placebo, multivitamin supplementation delayed SSVEP latency during retrieval, interpreted as an increase in inhibitory neural processes. Behavioural performance on the DRT was not improved by the multivitamin, however improved performance accuracy was associated with increased midline central SSVEP latency. There were no multivitamin-related effects on SSVEP amplitude.

Conclusion

These findings indicate that in the elderly, multivitamin supplementation may enhance neural efficiency during memory retrieval.

Highlights

► The SSVEP was examined before and after 16 weeks multivitamin or placebo treatment. ► The multivitamin increased SSVEP latency during spatial working memory performance. ► Increased latency was interpreted as an increase in inhibitory neural processes. ► Multivitamin supplementation may influence cognition by enhancing neural efficiency.