Mental Practice Combined with Physical Practice to Enhance Hand Recovery in Stroke Patients

Abstract

Objectives. To evaluate whether combining mental practice with physical practice training enhances hand function in patients with stroke. Methods. 10 for treatment and 10 for control were recruited for this pre/posttraining matched case control study. In the treatment group, subjects underwent combining mental practice with physical practice for four weeks. In the control group, subjects only participated in physical practice. Change of hand function and the number of activated voxels of the contralateral somatosensory motor cortex (SMC) acquired by functional magnetic resonance imaging were measured. Results. After training, the Action Research Arm Test score increased by 12.65 for treatment and by 5.20 for control. There was a significant difference in the Action Research Arm Test score between the two groups (P = 0.04). The activated voxels number of the contralateral SMC increased in both groups, but the activated voxels number in the contralateral SMC and the improvement of hand function for treatment were greater than for control. In the treatment group, the number of activated voxels of the contralateral SMC was positively correlated with better hand function scores. Conclusions. Combining mental practice with physical practice may be a more effective treatment strategy than physical training alone for hand recovery in stroke patients.

Role of Practice And Mental Imagery on Hand Function Improvement in Stroke Survivors

“…Of those articles, 2 were excluded because they were not completed studies Therefore, a total of nine articles were reviewed and classified according to the criteria described earlier. The results are summarized in Table 1 [1][2][3][4][5]. …”

Prática mental na recuperação do membro superior pós-acidente vascular encefálico – Revisão sistemática

“…Porém, foi achado um estudo em que os autores não encontraram diferença estatisticamente significativa na associação com outras técnicas. 9 E outro estudo que comparou apenas o tempo de duração da prática mental.¹² Os resultados obtidos no estudo de Liu et al, 11 confirmaram que a imagem motora teve efeitos benéficos, especialmente, em combinação com a execução motora (MP), quando utilizado em processo de reabilitação motora associado à fisioterapia convencional. Este corrobora com o estudo de Grabherr et al, o qual evidencia o benefício da formação de imagens motoras em pacientes com hemiparesia e, portanto, sugerem a integração do treinamento cognitivo na prática convencional de fisioterapia.…”

“…Assim, o treinamento baseado em ações executadas e imaginadas, ampliará a gama de áreas do cérebro implicadas no processo de reabilitação. 11,8 O Estudo de Park et al, 13 constatou que a eficá-cia da prática mental, quando combinada com outras abordagens é promissora, já que seu estudo combinou o uso da prática mental à técnica de terapia induzida em pacientes com AVC crônico. O uso combinado de duas técnicas proporcionaria mais tentativas de prática para as áreas corticais afetadas assim como a plasticidade neural do que técnicas isoladas.…”

Effective Motor Imagery Application: Examining Spinal Cord Excitability from the F-Wave and Autonomic Nervous Activity from LF/HF

“…Motor imagery is not limitation time, place, and using special equipment. Combination therapy for actual motion and motor imagery was improvement of upper limb function than only actual motion in post-stroke hemiparesis patients [3]. The only motor imagery case [4] is the comparison of muscular strengths after motor imagery of the little finger maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) abduction movement for 4 weeks among motor imagery, physical training, and control groups.…”