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Stroke
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Proof that “Mental Rehearsal” Changes the Brain in Stroke Patients |
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Monday, 16 November 2009 |
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Researchers from the Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation at the University of Cincinnati’s Academic Medical Center looked at the impact of “mental practice” (the imaginal rehearsal of physical movements) on affected arm movements in stroke patients, as well as changes in cortical mapping in the brain.
Mental practice (MP) is a noninvasive, inexpensive method of enabling repetitive, task-specific practice (RTP) which has been shown in past studies to increase affected arm use and function significantly more than just RTP alone.
As a next step, this 10-subject case series examined the possibility
that cortical plasticity is a mechanism underlying the positive
treatment effect from mental practice (MP) when combined with RTP
(repetitive task-specific practice). Ten chronic stroke patients (mean
= 36.7 months) exhibiting stable, moderate motor deficits, received
30-minute therapy sessions for their affected arms 3 days/week for 10
weeks, emphasizing valued activities of daily living (ADLs). |
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Guided Imagery Helps Post-Stroke Patients with Daily Task Performance in New Environments |
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Sunday, 28 June 2009 |
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Interested in building upon recent studies showing that imagery helps post-stroke patients relearn daily tasks, researchers from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University in Kowloon, Hong Kong, China investigated whether imagery could also help with generalizing skills on trained and untrained tasks in new environments in a small, randomized, controlled clinical trial.
Thirty-five acute post-stroke patients were randomly assigned to an
imagery training group (n=18) or conventional functional rehabilitation
(n=17) group. The imagery intervention was 3-weeks of standardized
practices and daily tasks using chunking-regulation-rehearsal
strategies.
Outcome measurements were the performances on trained and untrained tasks in the training and novel environments. |
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Brief Yoga Program Benefits Cholesterol, Triglicerides |
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Sunday, 01 February 2009 |
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Researchers from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi examined the short-term impact of a brief yoga intervention on some of the biochemical risk indicators for cardiovascular disease and diabetes mellitus.
Ninety-eight subjects (67 male, 31 female), ages 20-74, with hypertension, coronary artery disease, diabetes mellitus, and a variety of other illnesses, participated in a lifestyle training program that consisted of yoga asanas (postures), pranayama (breathing exercises), relaxation techniques, group support, individualized advice, lectures and films on the philosophy of yoga and the place of yoga in daily life, meditation, stress management, nutrition, and knowledge about their disease. |
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Imagery Shows Big Gains for Post-Stroke Paralysis |
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Sunday, 07 September 2008 |
If you thought I was exaggerating about the recent spike in research on motor imagery for stroke, check out these 3 recent studies, and then click here for a whole other stash of them, already archived....
IMAGERY SHOWS BIG GAINS FOR POST-STROKE HEMIPARESIS
 Researchers from the Wingate Institute in Netanya, Israel, tested the feasibility of using a home-based motor imagery gait training program to improve walking performance of people suffering from chronic poststroke hemiparesis.
Seventeen community-dwelling volunteers with hemiparesis caused by a unilateral stroke that occurred at least 3 months before the study were recruited. They received 15 minutes of supervised imagery gait training in their homes 3 days a week for 6 weeks. The intervention addressed gait impairments of the affected lower limb and task-specific gait training.
Walking ability was evaluated by kinematics and functional scales twice before the intervention, 3 and 6 weeks after the intervention began, and at the 3-week follow-up. |
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Visuo-motor learning with combination of different rates of motor imagery and physical practice. |
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Thursday, 01 May 2008 |
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Imagery Rehearsal Found Critical in Motor Rehab for Stroke, Better than Physical Practice Alone
Researchers from the University of Lyon in Bron Cedex, France
tested whether "mental rehearsal" (motor imagery) is equivalent to
physical learning in restoring motor function in hemiplegic patients
(paralyzed on one side), and examined what would be optimal proportions
of real execution vs. rehearsal.
Subjects were asked to grasp an object and insert it into an adapted
slot. One group (G0) practiced the task only by physical execution (240
trials); three groups imagined performing the task in different rates
of trials (25%, G25; 50%, G50; 75%, G75), and physically executed
movements for the remaining trials; a fourth, control group imagined a
visual rotation task in 75% of the trials and then performed the same
motor task as the other groups.
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Motor imagery and action observation: cognitive tools for rehabilitation. |
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Thursday, 17 April 2008 |
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In Neurological Rehab, Imagining Movement Delivers the Goods
A Dutch literature review concludes that imagining movement creates the same flow of sensory information that leads to the reacquisition of motor skills.
In rehab, active exercising creates the flow of sensory information
responsible for the learning or relearning of lost (or newly needed)
motor skills. This review article addresses whether active physical
exercise is always necessary for creating this sensory flow.
It points to numerous studies indicating that motor imagery can result
in the same plastic changes in the motor system that actual physical
practice provides. Motor imagery is the mental execution of a movement
without any overt, corresponding movement or without any peripheral
(muscle) activation.
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Guided motor imagery helps with athletic performance, neurological conditions. |
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Friday, 28 March 2008 |
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Guided Motor Imagery Helps with Athletic Performance, Neurological Conditions
Investigators at the University of Haifa in Israel
reviewed the literature to determine the positive effects of guided
motor imagery practice on motor performance. There is abundant evidence
that motor performance is improved in athletes, people who are healthy,
and people with neurological conditions, such as stroke, spinal cord
injury and Parkinson’s disease. This article discusses how to integrate
motor imagery into a physical therapy practice and goes into
particulars of visual and kinesthetic motor imagery, factors that
modify motor imagery practice, the design of motor imagery protocols,
and potential applications of motor imagery.
Citation: Dickstein R, Deutsch JE. Motor imagery in physical
therapist practice. Physical Therapy. 2007 Jul; 87 (7): pages 942-53.
Epub 2007 May 1
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The adjunctive role of mental practice in the rehabilitation of the upper limb after hemiplegic stro |
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Monday, 04 October 2004 |
In a small pilot study, researchers from The University of Ulster,
Newtownabbey, in Antrim, Northern Ireland examined the efficacy of
mental practice (imagery) as an adjunct in the rehabilitation of the
upper limb following stroke with patients on a rehabilitation unit in
Belfast. Subjects were 14 patients admitted for rehabilitation of their
first stroke: six men and four women, aged 45-81, between 10 and 176
days post stroke.
Each patient underwent a single-case design, with two weeks baseline,
two weeks intervention and one week withdrawal. The intervention
consisted of structured daily mental practice sessions of a reach and
grasp task, in addition to their usual therapy. The upper limb
component of the Motricity Index was used to grade motor activity
sequentially across the timescale of the study. |
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Using motor imagery in the rehabilitation of hemiparesis. |
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Monday, 18 August 2003 |
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Researchers from the Sensory Motor Performance Program at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago examined the effectiveness of a program of imagining movement, or motor imagery training, in the rehabilitation of hemiparesis, using a before-after trial with clinical and behavioral analyses of single cases.
Two survivors of embolic middle cerebral artery stroke that resulted in chronic hemiparesis received training consisting of 12 one-hour sessions, 3 times a week, for 4 consecutive weeks, of imagining wrist movements (extension, pronation-supination) and mental simulations of reaching and object manipulation, making use of a mirror box apparatus. |
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Traditional Chinese medicine: one country, two systems. |
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Friday, 15 August 2003 |
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Hesketh and Zhu looked at the effects of acupuncture on stroke patients in rehabilitation in China, and found that improvement was significantly greater among the acupuncture group than in the controls.
Citation: Hesketh T, Zhu WX. Health in China. Traditional Chinese medicine: one country, two systems. Behavioral Medicine Journal. 1997 Jul; 315 (7100): 115-117. |
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