COGNITIVE GAIN WITH REPETITIVE TRANSCRANIAL MAGNETIC STIMULATION IN POST-STROKE MOTOR TARGET

Abstract

We aimed to verify the effects of rTMS on cognition in stroke patients after stimulation of the primary motor cortex (M1). We selected 20 stroke patients from a Rehabilitation Center.They were divided into two groups: (RM1) - Right primary motor cortex and (LM1) - Left primary motor cortex. They had 20 sessions of 20 minutes each and were evaluated using the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MOCA).The MOCA test demonstrated a significant increase in total scores for the LM1 group comparing pre-and post-intervention periods [(19.55 ± 4.93) X (22.45 ± 5.32)] (p=0.006), and for the RM1 group was not statistically significant [(18.56 ± 3.05) X (20.00 ± 3.39)] (p= 0.51). The subtests that increased the overall performance in LM1 were "attention" [(3.27 ± 1.62) x (4.45 ± 1.29)] (p=0.030), "memory" [(2.27 ± 1.79) x (3.36 ± 1.86)] p= (0.026), and "abstraction" [(1.00 ± 0.89) x (1.36 ± 0.81)] (p=0.045). In RM1, the subtest "naming" showed a statistically significant increase [(2.44 ± 0.53) X (2.89 ± 0.33)] (p=0.046). This study concluded that rTMS increases general cognitive performance with repercussions in attention, memory, and abstraction when stimulated in LM1. Stimulation in RM1 increased performance in "naming" with effects on the rehabilitation process of the patients.