When a person suffers from a stroke, the nerve cells in the brain die away due to blockage in supply of blood. This results in failure in motor skills because the nerves are dead and the connection between the brain and the nerves is lost. The methods that are in use bypass the damaged area of the brain and use other brain cells to handle the lost function. As there are less number of neurons to spare, the patient has to face a movement disability that is long lasting. Now, researchers at the university of Texas, Dallas have found a way out to speed up the motor skill recovery process with the help of the vagus nerve stimulation methodology.
The Vagus nerve is responsible for controlling the parasympathetic nervous system which in turn supervises numerous bodily functions like circulation and digestion. A device is implanted in the neck to achieve electrical stimulation. VSN, has been already used for treating depression and is a well- documented technique for fine tuning the functioning of the brain. The role of the VNS is to strengthen the path that leads to the neurons that is damaged after stroke. There has been a visible increase of three fold to five fold in the engaged neuron with VNS addition to the rehab.
The study determines that if we use the approach to deal with complicated motor skills, these improvements further improve the simple movements. It is a significant step in creating guidelines for using VS for post stroke therapy as per the researchers.
The results of the preclinical study carried out by the scientists here showed that the recovery in rodents on which the vagus stimulation (VNS) couple with physical therapy experiment was carried out, doubled long term recovery rate as compared to the therapy in use in these times.
The work is already published in the journal Stroke, and the trial is already on in humans in Dallas and 15 other sites in the country. The researchers have also developed an application that can help us monitor their performance and recovery process remotely too while they use it at home for improving their upper limb motor skills.
Rajarajeswari Heart Center, part of the esteem institute, Rajarajeswari Medical College and Hospital. Was established in May 2012 as an initial non-interventional department with 2D echocardiography, Treadmill Test and cardiac consultation.