A study released on 28/2/2014 has pointed out that Johns Hopkins researchers, with study leader as Rachel E Salas, MD., an assistant professor of neurology in Johns Hopkins University school of medicine, reports that people with chronic insomina show more plasticity and activity than good sleepers in the part of brain that controls movement (motor cortex). Salas and her team reporting in the March issue of the journal of sleep found that the motor cortex in those with chronic insomnia was more adaptable to change- more plastic than in a group of good sleepers. They also found more excitability among neurons in thesame region among those with chronic insomnia, adding evidence to the notion that insomniacs are in a constant state of heightened information processing that may interferre with sleep. Reseachers say they hope their study opens the door to do better diagnosis and treatment of the most common and often intractable sleep disoder that affects an estimated 15 percent of the united state population. They involved the subjects in a transcranial magnetic stimulation(TMS) of selected brain parts in the motor cortex prior to instigating a use dependednt plasticity(UDP) program. Because lack of sleep has been linked to decreased memory and concentration during the day, Salas and her colleagues suspected that brains of the good sleepers cud be more easily retrained. The results however were the opposite. The reseachers found more plasticity in the brains of those with chronic insomnia. Salas said it is possible that the dysregulation of arousal describeded in chronic insomnia- increased metabolism, increased cortisol levels, constant worrying might be linked to increased plasticity in some way. Salas says the origin of the plasticity in insomniacs is not clear whether the increase is insomnia, its is also unknown whether this increase is beneficial, the source of the problem or a form of compensatory mechanism to address the consequence of sleep deprivation assosciated with chronic insomnia. Patients with chronic phantom pain post-limb amputation and dystonia also showed thesame increased brain plasticity in the motor cortex, with detrimental effects. The study cud shed more light to us Physiotherapists in the management of patients with parkinsonism symptoms, patients with pertubed motor programing ailments generally like in athetoid Celebral palsy, in a possible combo-management of spastic and rigid cases since Salas also says that this study shows that TMS mayb be able to play a role in diagnosing insomnia and MORE IMPORTANTLY, she says, potentially prove to be a treatment for insomnia, perhaps via REDUCING ExCITABILITY. This cud also help us understand a better mechanism involved in arthrogenic muscle inhibition and a possible corrective approach in its post- trauma manifestations....we are advancing and we shall soon define a better word than professionals in discribing physiotherapists.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Mar 2014 16:27:57 +0000
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