Deans' stroke musings: Motor Activated Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation as a Potential Neuromodulation Approach for Post-Stroke Motor Rehabilitation: A Pilot Study

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, May 22, 2023

Motor Activated Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation as a Potential Neuromodulation Approach for Post-Stroke Motor Rehabilitation: A Pilot Study

But you don't tell us if this was any better that all this other vagus nerve research.

vagus nerve (67 posts to July 2012)
vagus nerve stimulation (1 post to February 2023)
- paired vagus nerve stimulation (2 posts to April 2022)

The latest here:

Motor Activated Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation as a Potential Neuromodulation Approach for Post-Stroke Motor Rehabilitation: A Pilot Study

Bashar W. Badran, PhD https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9376-6440 badran@musc.edu, Xiaolong Peng, PhD https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4488-9628, and Steve Kautz, PhD https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3151-8235View all authors and affiliations

OnlineFirst

https://doi.org/10.1177/15459683231173357

Abstract

Background

Implanted vagus nerve stimulation (VNS), when synchronized with post-stroke motor rehabilitation improves conventional motor rehabilitation training. A non-invasive VNS method known as transcutaneous auricular vagus nerves stimulation (taVNS) has emerged, which may mimic the effects of implanted VNS.

Objective

To determine whether taVNS paired with motor rehabilitation improves post-stroke motor function, and whether synchronization with movement and amount of stimulation is critical to outcomes.

Methods

We developed a closed-loop taVNS system for motor rehabilitation called motor activated auricular vagus nerve stimulation (MAAVNS) and conducted a randomized, double-blind, pilot trial investigating the use of MAAVNS to improve upper limb function in 20 stroke survivors. Participants attended 12 rehabilitation sessions over 4-weeks, and were assigned to a group that received either MAAVNS or active unpaired taVNS concurrently with task-specific training. Motor assessments were conducted at baseline, and weekly during rehabilitation training. Stimulation pulses were counted for both groups.

Results

A total of 16 individuals completed the trial, and both MAAVNS (n = 9) and unpaired taVNS (n = 7) demonstrated improved Fugl-Meyer Assessment upper extremity scores (Mean ± SEM, MAAVNS: 5.00 ± 1.02, unpaired taVNS: 3.14 ± 0.63). MAAVNS demonstrated greater effect size (Cohen’s d = 0.63) compared to unpaired taVNS (Cohen’s d = 0.30). Furthermore, MAAVNS participants received significantly fewer stimulation pulses (Mean ± SEM, MAAVNS: 36 070 ± 3205) than the fixed 45 000 pulses unpaired taVNS participants received (P < .05).

Conclusion

This trial suggests(So you didn't make the research robust enough to determine that.) stimulation timing likely matters, and that pairing taVNS with movements may be superior to an unpaired approach. Additionally, MAAVNS effect size is comparable to that of the implanted VNS approach.