Effect of magnitopuncture on sympathetic and parasympathetic nerve activities in healthy drivers – assessment by power spectrum analysis of heart rate variability

Abstract

The object of this study was to assess the effects of magnitopuncture applied to Dazhui (DU14) point and Neiguan (PC6) points on sympathetic and parasympathetic nerve activities by power spectrum analysis of heart rate variability in healthy drivers during simulated driving. Using power spectrum analysis, the low frequency (LF) and high frequency (HF) components of heart rate variability can be calculated reflecting the sympathetic and parasympathetic activity. The 40 healthy male subjects were randomly divided into two groups: A (study group) and B (control group). All subjects were required to be well rested before the experiment. The subjects of both groups were required to perform a simulated driving task for 3 h. During the driving, magnitopunctures were applied to the DU14 and PC6 points for A while the subject performed the task for 2.5 h, and for B magnitopunctures were applied to non-acupuncture points which were 1.5 cm away from the two acupuncture points respectively over the same time. Subjective response to a questionnaire was obtained after the simulated task in the two groups. At the end of the driving task the LF component in normalized units (NU) had decreased significantly ( P<0.05) indicating a reduced sympathetic nerve activity and the HF component (NU) increased significantly ( P<0.05) indicating a increased parasympathetic nerve activity for A compared with pre-stimulation while for B no significant differences were observed. There were significant group differences in LF (NU), HF (NU) and LF:HF at the end of the driving task ( P<0.05). It was concluded that a modulating effect of magnitopuncture on sympathetic and parasympathetic nerve activities in healthy subjects was associated with the acupuncture points. The findings represent physiological evidence that magnitopuncture may reduce mental fatigue in healthy drivers.

Effect of different vibration frequencies on heart rate variability and driving fatigue in healthy drivers

“…The results indicated that the sympathovagal balance of healthy drivers under vibration conditions had changed significantly, while no similar significant change was obtained in the subjects under no vibration conditions in the same time session. The results have been proved for our previous study (Li, 2003) and supported by Gohara et al (1996). Considering crossover effects of time and vibration factor, we observed significant crossover effects in HF and LF:HF and no significant crossover effect in LF during simulated driving.…”

Assessment of cerebral oxygenation during prolonged simulated driving using near infrared spectroscopy: its implications for fatigue development

“…Fatigue is believed to be a major contributing factor to errors made by drivers (Nilsson et al 1997). Our previous studies demonstrated that fatigue contributed to the decline of performance during prolonged driving (Li et al 2003(Li et al , 2004(Li et al , 2005. However, fatigue is a complex phenomenon that is not fully understood and is generally attributed to either central (neuronal) or peripheral (muscular) origin, or both (Gandevia 2001).…”

Physiological Assessment of Driving Mental Fatigue Using Wavelet Packet Energy and Random Forests

“…These evidences indicated that driving mental fatigue was induced after 90 min driving task. According to Li's subjective fatigue scale (LSFS) [24] (the subjective scores ranged from 1 to 7, a scale which represented no, minimally, somewhat, a little, considerably, very and extremely), the mental fatigue scores increased from 1.31 to 5.46 (P<0.005) at the end of task.…”