Abstract
Accumulating evidence indicates that motor imagery and motor execution share common neural networks. Accordingly, mental practices in the form of motor imagery have been implemented in rehabilitation regimes of stroke patients with favorable results. Because direct monitoring of motor imagery is difficult, feedback of cortical activities related to motor imagery (neurofeedback) could help to enhance efficacy of mental practice with motor imagery. To determine the feasibility and efficacy of a real-time neurofeedback system mediated by near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), two separate experiments were performed. Experiment 1 was used in five subjects to evaluate whether real-time cortical oxygenated hemoglobin signal feedback during a motor execution task correlated with reference hemoglobin signals computed off-line. Results demonstrated that the NIRS-mediated neurofeedback system reliably detected oxygenated hemoglobin signal changes in real-time. In Experiment 2, 21 subjects performed motor imagery of finger movements with feedback from relevant cortical signals and irrelevant sham signals. Real neurofeedback induced significantly greater activation of the contralateral premotor cortex and greater self-assessment scores for kinesthetic motor imagery compared with sham feedback. These findings suggested the feasibility and potential effectiveness of a NIRS-mediated real-time neurofeedback system on performance of kinesthetic motor imagery. However, these results warrant further clinical trials to determine whether this system could enhance the effects of mental practice in stroke patients.
Highlights
Motor imagery is a dynamic state during which a subject mentally simulates a specific movement without any overt movement [1]
Results from the present study demonstrated that the near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) system can be used to detect real-time task-related hemoglobin signal changes, and this system can be reliably used as a neurofeedback tool
For tasks related to motor imagery, difficulty of objective evaluation has traditionally hampered collection and dissemination of correct information pertaining to task performance
Summary
Motor imagery is a dynamic state during which a subject mentally simulates a specific movement without any overt movement [1]. The subjects feel that they perform the movement with all the sensory consequences (first-person perspective). During visual motor imagery, the subjects see themselves performing the movement as from a distance (third-person perspective). The inappropriate use of motor imagery could be one of the possible reasons why only a limited number of patients benefit from mental practice using motor imagery. Under this assumption, it was hypothesized that the efficacy of mental practice with motor imagery could be improved if the subjects performed appropriate mental imagery
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