Raising Pain Tolerance Using Guided Imagery (Part 1)
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Inhibitory control can be boosted with a mild form of brain stimulation, according to a study published in the June 2011 issue of Neuroimage, Elsevier’s Journal of Brain Function. The study’s findings indicate that non-invasive intervention can greatly improve patients’ inhibitory control. Conducted by a research team led by Dr. Chi-Hung Juan of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, National Central University in Taiwan, the research was sponsored by the National Science Council in Taiwan, the UK Medical Research Council, the Royal Society Wolfson Merit Award, and a Fulbright Award.
Medications are the mainstay of treatment for epilepsy, but for a considerable number of patients — estimated to be as many as 1 million in the U.S. — drugs do not work. These patients suffer from a type of epilepsy known as refractory or drug-resistant epilepsy, in which drugs cannot control their seizures. But at an epilepsy conference last month, Dr. Christopher DeGiorgio, a UCLA professor of neurology, presented the results of a non-invasive, non-pharmaceutical treatment that shows promise in controlling seizures.
Patients suffering from dystonia, an uncommon yet potentially crippling movement disorder, get better results if they begin deep brain stimulation therapy sooner rather than later, according to an international study published in the March issue of the Journal of Neurology. Dystonia causes muscles to contract with the affected body part twisting involuntarily and symptoms ranging from mild to severe.
Shooting steady pulses of electricity through slender electrodes into a brain area that controls complex behaviors has proven to be effective against several therapeutically stubborn neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. Now, a new study has found that this technique, called deep brain stimulation (DBS), targets the same class of neuronal cells that are known to respond to physical exercise and drugs such as Prozac.
By applying electrical current to the brain, researchers reporting online on November 4 in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, have shown that they could enhance a person’s mathematical performance for up to 6 months without influencing their other cognitive functions. The findings may lead to treatments for the estimated 20 percent of the population with moderate to severe numerical disabilities (for example, dyscalculia) and for those who lose their skill with numbers as a result of stroke or degenerative disease, according to the researchers.
The next advance in treating major depression may relate to a group of brain chemicals that are involved in virtually all our brain activity, according to a study published today in Biological Psychiatry. The study is co-authored by Drs. Andrea J. Levinson and Zafiris J. Daskalakis of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). [...]
The book “Bioelectromagnetism: Principles and Applications of Bioelectric and Biomagnetic Fields” from Oxford University Press is now available online for free. An extended review will not be given here since readers have access to the entire book. The bioelectromagnetism of cells and synapses, as well as of various organs, such as the heart and the [...]
