Experimental study of transcranial pulsed current stimulation on relieving athlete’s mental fatigue

Abstract

ObjectiveTo explore the effect of independently developed transcranial pulsed current stimulation (tPCS) on alleviating athlete’s mental fatigue.MethodsA total of 60 college athletes were randomly divided into the active stimulation group (current intensity:1.5 mA, lasting for 15 min) and the sham stimulation group. Subjective questionnaires, behavior test, and functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) test were conducted before and after the experiment. Two-way ANOVA with repeated measures was used to compare the differences in mental fatigue indexes before and after the two experimental conditions.ResultsAfter 7 days of exercise training, there was a significant difference in the main effect of the time factor in all indexes of the two groups (p < 0.05). The scores of rated perceived exertion (RPE) scale, positive and negative affect schedule (PANAS), critical flicker frequency (CFF), and reaction time (RT), in the tPCS treatment group, were better than those in the sham stimulation group (p < 0.05). After 7 days of exercise training, all the subjects had different degrees of athlete’s mental fatigue; the subjects in the active stimulation group have a good evaluation of the tPCS developed by the research group without adverse actions.ConclusiontPCS intervention can improve emotional state, reduce the subjective evaluation of fatigue, improve behavioral levels such as attention and reaction time and increase cerebral prefrontal blood flow and oxygen supply.

Transcranial pulsed current stimulation: A scoping review of the current literature on scope, nature, underlying mechanisms, and gaps

“…Physiological and cognitive‐behavioral outcomes. Three studies indicated significant effects of tPCS on biochemical (Wu et al., 2022a), mental (Shen et al., 2022), and physical fatigue (Wu et al., 2022b). Although one study demonstrated that tPCS over the somatosensory cortex improves sensory perception (Saito et al., 2019), another study failed to show any effects over the posterior parietal lobe on tactile discrimination (Saito et al., 2022).…”

“…The sample size in studies on healthy male and female populations ranged from 5 to 100 individuals between the ages of 18 and 65 (Alon et al., 2011; Dissanayaka, Farrell, et al., 2022; Dissanayaka, Zoghi, et al., 2022; Dissanayaka, Zoghi, Farrell, et al., 2020; Dissanayaka, Zoghi, Hill, et al., 2020; Jaberzadeh et al., 2014, 2015; Luu et al., 2016; Morales‐Quezada et al., 2016; Morales‐Quezada, Castro‐Saavedra, et al., 2015; Morales‐Quezada, Cosmo, et al., 2015; Paneri et al., 2016; Vasquez et al., 2016). Since women's menstrual cycle may potentially affect the size of CSE induced by tPCS, some studies have exclusively recruited male participants 21–25 years old (Saito et al., 2019, 2022) or college athletes (Shen et al., 2022; Wu et al., 2022a, 2022b). In studies with patient populations, the sample sizes ranged from 6 to 70 participants between the ages of 2 and 85 (Alon et al., 2011; Barra et al., 2022; Castro et al., 2021; Iddings et al., 2019, 2021; Liu et al., 2021; Singh et al., 2019; Thibaut, Russo, Hurtado‐Puerto, et al., 2017).…”

“…Methodologically, except for four studies (Luu et al., 2016; Ma et al., 2019; Saito et al., 2019; Singh et al., 2019) that were not mentioned, all other studies employed randomized designs with either single‐blinded (Dissanayaka, Farrell, et al., 2022; Dissanayaka, Zoghi, et al., 2022; Jaberzadeh et al., 2014, 2015; Mansouri et al., 2019; Paneri et al., 2016) or double‐blinded (Barra et al., 2022; Dissanayaka, Farrell, et al., 2022; Dissanayaka, Zoghi, et al., 2022; Dissanayaka, Zoghi, Farrell, et al., 2020; Liu et al., 2021; Morales‐Quezada et al., 2014, 2016; Morales‐Quezada, Castro‐Saavedra, et al., 2015; Morales‐Quezada, Cosmo, et al., 2015; Saavedra et al., 2014; Shen et al., 2022; Thibaut, Russo, Morales‐Quezada, et al., 2017; Vasquez et al., 2016, 2017; Wu et al., 2022a, 2022b). Even though all included studies used sham stimulation as a control, four studies had control groups in which no intervention was administered (Barra et al., 2022; Castro et al., 2021; Dissanayaka, Farrell, et al., 2022; Iddings et al., 2021), and two studies did not refer to any control groups at all (Thibaut, Russo, Hurtado‐Puerto, et al., 2017; Vasquez et al., 2017).…”

“…Methodologically, except for four studies (Luu et al, 2016;Ma et al, 2019;Saito et al, 2019;Singh et al, 2019) that were not mentioned, all other studies employed randomized designs with either single-blinded Jaberzadeh et al, 2014Jaberzadeh et al, , 2015Mansouri et al, 2019;Paneri et al, 2016) or double-blinded (Barra et al, 2022;Liu et al, 2021;Morales-Quezada et al, 2014 Saavedra et al, 2014;Shen et al, 2022;Vasquez et al, 2016Vasquez et al, , 2017Wu et al, 2022aWu et al, , 2022b. Even though all included studies used sham stimulation as a control, four studies had control groups in which no intervention was administered (Barra et al, 2022;Castro et al, 2021;Iddings et al, 2021), and two studies did not refer to any control groups at all Vasquez et al, 2017).…”

“…The sample size in studies on healthy male and female populations ranged from 5 to 100 individuals between the ages of 18 and 65 (Alon et al, 2011; Paneri et al, 2016;Vasquez et al, 2016). Since women's menstrual cycle may potentially affect the size of CSE induced by tPCS, some studies have exclusively recruited male participants 21-25 years old (Saito et al, 2019(Saito et al, , 2022 or college athletes (Shen et al, 2022;Wu et al, 2022aWu et al, , 2022b. In studies with patient populations, the sample sizes ranged from 6 to 70 participants between the ages of 2 and 85 (Alon et al, 2011;Barra et al, 2022;Castro et al, 2021;Iddings et al, 2019Iddings et al, , 2021Liu et al, 2021;Singh et al, 2019;.…”