View clinical trials related to Acquired Brain Injury.
Filter by:This project will determine the feasibility and validity of measuring elbow muscle flexor stiffness in a population of patients with sub-acute severe acquired brain injury using two measurement methods, the portable spasticity assessment device (PSAD) (Movotec, Charlottenlund, Denmark) and an ultrasound measurement called shear wave sonoelastography (SWE).
This study evaluates the addition of therapy dogs in inpatient physical and occupational therapy. Data will be collected across 10 PT and 10 OT sessions, half of which will incorporate a therapy dog.
Working memory is a limited capacity cognitive system in which information is held temporarily in order to make it available for processing. The amount of information that can be held in mind varies considerably from person to person and changes across the lifespan. Working memory is frequently affected following brain injury. As working memory is important for cognitive skills such as problem solving, planning and active listening, a deficit in working memory can lead to difficulties with many everyday activities that are necessary for work, study and general functioning. Impaired working memory may consequently have a significant impact on a person's quality of life and ability to participate in previous social roles, with potential for effects on mood and emotional wellbeing. Evidence shows that non-invasive transcranial direct current brain stimulation (tDCS) can be used in combination with computerized memory training (CT) over multiple days, to enhance working memory in healthy and clinical populations. In patients with an acquired brain injury (ABI), cognitive training or brain stimulation have been used alone to improve attention or memory-related impairment, but the effect of the concurrent used of the two interventions over multiple days is yet to be investigated. With this research the investigators propose to investigate the effect of the combined use of tDCS and CT to improve memory performance in patients with acquired brain injury. The investigators propose to use a multi-day cognitive training regime to exercise working memory, while stimulating the brain with low intensity direct currents. Success will be measured as improvement in performance in several cognitive domain, before and after training.
The aim of the study is to investigate the effectiveness of motor and cognitive virtual environment rehabilitation on upper limb function in sub-acute patients after an acquired brain injury.
This study evaluates the validity of an intravascular continuous glucose monitoring microdialysis probe, and compares the values to routinely inserted cerebral glucose microdialysis to evaluate the hypothesised relationship between intracranial and intravascular glucose levels.
This is a pilot study. The objective is to further understand the mechanism by which amantadine improves function in patients with persistent vegetative state and minimally conscious state. Specifically, the investigators will measure the size of the nerve fibers that mediate arousal (reticular activating system, or RAS) pre and post treatment on MRI tractography. MRI findings will be correlated with the Disability Rating Scale (DRS) score. The information gathered from this study will be used to formulate a larger clinical trial.
This research project aims to find out if a multiplayer online video game can provide therapeutic benefit for people who have survived a brain injury. Video games provide therapeutic benefits in many contexts (Griffiths, 2005). Players of online multiplayer games behave altruistically and form friendships (Wang and Wang, 2008). These positive emotional effects may enhance cognitive rehabilitation, because the cognitive and emotional sides of rehabilitation are connected (Mateer, 2005). The hypothesis is thus: that playing multiplayer online games can be a useful form of cognitive rehabilitation for brain-injured people. This research will identify whether or not multi-player online video games may be used as a complementary therapeutic tool. A further aim is to develop guidelines which would help others considering the use of video games for cognitive rehabilitation.
Heart Rate Variability (HRV) reflects the responsiveness of the autonomic system to an external stimuli. The aim of this system is to maintain homeostasis.The variability implies on the interaction between the sympathetic and the parasympathetic systems to maintain the ongoing changes of the autonomic system. Following Acquired Brain Injury (ABI), there can be a damage to the Central Nervous System (CNS) function. The damages described in the literature are cognitive, motor and behavioural function, while there is less relation to the autonomic system. The autonomic system can influence the ability of patient with ABI to participate in the rehabilitation program. The aim of this work is to investigate the activity of the autonomic system activity as manifested by HRV among patients with ABI in different conditions: resting, during activity and while listening to different auditory stimuli.
Following a brain injury (BI) in addition to all other systems, there can be a failure in the control of the autonomic system activity. Heart rate (HR) has its own normal variability. Heart rate is controlled by the Sympathetic and Parasympathetic systems. Therefore, monitoring HR variability (HRV) can help us evaluate the balance of the two systems and their efficiency.Decrease in HRV was found to be in correlation with death among patients in the acute stage following ABI. Decrease in HRV is a pre-stage of HR irregularity and ventricular fibrillation.This disturbance can have a great impact on the patients health condition. In addition there was found an inverse correlation between this situation and the rehabilitation outcomes. Based on this data there is a great importance in monitoring HRV during rehabilitation among patients following BI while the patients are required to perform physical activity.The aim of this work is to check whether we can replace the traditional way of measuring HR by EKG Holter (gold standard) with a more simple,accessible tool-the POLAR watch. The aim of this work is to check if the data collected from a POLAR watch is reliable compared to the data collected from an EKG holter.