Greater Occipital Nerve Stimulation Boosts Associative Memory in Older Individuals: A Randomized Trial.
Alison M LuckeyS Lauren McLeodIan H RobertsonWing Ting ToSven VannestePublished in: Neurorehabilitation and neural repair (2020)
Transcutaneous electrical stimulation (tES) is a new approach that aims to stimulate the brain. Recently, we have developed tES approaches to enhance plasticity that modulate cortical activity via the greater occipital nerve (ON) in a "bottom-up" way. Thirty subjects between the ages of 55 and 70 years were enrolled and tested using a double-blind, sham-controlled, and randomized design. Half of the participants received active stimulation, while the other half received sham stimulation. Our results demonstrate that ON-tES can enhance memory in older individuals after one session, with effects persisting up to 28 days after stimulation. The hypothesized mechanism by which ON-tES enhances memory is activation of the locus coeruleus-noradrenaline (LC-NA) pathway. It is likely that this pathway was activated after ON-tES, as supported by observed changes in α-amylase concentrations, a biomarker for noradrenaline. There were no significant or long-lasting side effects observed during stimulation. Clinicaltrial.gov (NCT03467698).
Keyphrases
- double blind
- working memory
- physical activity
- spinal cord injury
- middle aged
- open label
- randomized controlled trial
- transcranial direct current stimulation
- white matter
- mass spectrometry
- resting state
- high resolution
- multiple sclerosis
- phase ii
- liquid chromatography
- brain injury
- genome wide association study
- high resolution mass spectrometry