Géraldine Martens, David Ibáñez-Soria, Alice Barra, Aureli Soria-Frisch, Andrea Piarulli, Olivia Gosseries, Ricardo Salvador, Andrés Rojas, Michael A Nitsche, Eleni Kroupi, Steven Laureys, Giulio Ruffini, Aurore Thibaut
Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) applied over the prefrontal cortex has been shown to improve behavioral responsiveness in patients with disorders of consciousness following severe brain injury, especially those in minimally conscious state (MCS). However, one potential barrier of clinical response to tDCS is the timing of stimulation with regard to the fluctuations of vigilance that characterize this population. Indeed, a previous study showed that the vigilance of MCS patients has periodic average cycles of 70 minutes (range 57-80 minutes), potentially preventing them to be in an optimal neural state to benefit from tDCS when applied randomly...
April 17, 2021: Behavioural Brain Research