Deans' stroke musings: Anodal tDCS Combined With Radial Nerve Stimulation Promotes Hand Motor Recovery in the Acute Phase After Ischemic Stroke

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.

Monday, August 24, 2015

Anodal tDCS Combined With Radial Nerve Stimulation Promotes Hand Motor Recovery in the Acute Phase After Ischemic Stroke

Well shit, if this works write up a damned stroke protocol on it and publish it so survivors will be better served.
http://nnr.sagepub.com/content/29/8/743?etoc

¹Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Toulouse, Toulouse, France
²Inserm, Imagerie cérébrale et handicaps neurologiques UMR 825, Toulouse, France
³Université de Toulouse, Toulouse, France
⁴Centre d’Investigation Clinique, CHU Purpan, Toulouse, France

Marion Simonetta-Moreau, Service de Neurologie, CHU Purpan, place du Dr Baylac, 31059 Toulouse cedex TSA40031, France. Email: simonetta.m@chu-toulouse.fr

Abstract

Background and Objective. The question of the best therapeutic window in which noninvasive brain stimulation (NIBS) could potentiate the plastic changes for motor recovery after a stroke is still unresolved. Most of the previous NIBS studies included patients in the chronic phase of recovery and very few in the subacute or acute phase. We investigated the effect of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) combined with repetitive peripheral nerve stimulation (rPNS) on the time course of motor recovery in the acute phase after a stroke.

Methods. Twenty patients enrolled within the first few days after a stroke were randomized in 2 parallel groups: one receiving 5 consecutive daily sessions of anodal tDCS over the ipsilesional motor cortex in association with rPNS and the other receiving the same rPNS combined with sham tDCS. Motor performance (primary endpoint: Jebsen and Taylor Hand Function Test [JHFT]) and transcranial magnetic stimulation cortical excitability measures were obtained at baseline (D1), at the end of the treatment (D5), and at 2 and 4 weeks’ follow-up (D15 and D30).

Results. The time course of motor recovery of the 2 groups of patients was different and positively influenced by the intervention (Group × Time interaction P = .01). The amount of improvement on the JHFT was greater at D15 and D30 in the anodal tDCS group than in the sham group. Conclusion. These results show that early cortical neuromodulation with anodal tDCS combined with rPNS can promote motor hand recovery and that the benefit is still present 1 month after the stroke.