Targeting unlesioned pharyngeal motor cortex improves swallowing in healthy individuals and after dysphagic stroke.

ABSTRACT:

Background & aims

Patients with stroke experience swallowing problems (dysphagia); increased risk of aspiration pneumonia, malnutrition, and dehydration; and have increased mortality. We investigated the behavioral and neurophysiological effects of a new neurostimulation technique (paired associative stimulation [PAS]), applied to the pharyngeal motor cortex, on swallowing function in healthy individuals and patients with dysphagia from stroke.

Methods

We examined the optimal parameters of PAS to promote plasticity by combining peripheral pharyngeal (electrical) with cortical stimulation. A virtual lesion was used as an experimental model of stroke, created with 1-Hz repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation over the pharyngeal cortex in 12 healthy individuals. We tested

SUBMITTER: Michou E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4300844 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature