Look In the mirror instead of drugs &ndash to take; for phantom pain, this actually works. Scientists have now been able to demonstrate what changes a mirror therapy in the brain causes. The could predict how well a therapy in certain patients will help.
In front of the mirror therapy, the Team from the Department of Learning and plasticity found at the National Institute of Mental Health in Maryland has a strong activity in a particular brain area, if Amputee saw a picture of your feet. This unexpected activation in humans without any amputations does not exist. In the course of the mirror therapy, this activity decreased more and more, and the phantom pain were reduced also: In the course of four weeks, they fell by 46 percent. Through the demonstration of how the mirror therapy changes the brain activity, scientists can now better predict how strong the therapy is to relieve the pain of a particular patient.
Phantom pain in a missing body part occur in more than 90 percent of Amputees, and can deploy 24 hours after the Operation. The drugs don’t work well against it, and for a long time treating this type of pain with a mirror therapy. The patients complete symmetrical Exercises and watch in the mirror, how your phantom limb is moving. "The mirror therapy fools the brain by the visual Input", Dr. Annie Chan from Brunel University in London said. In the brain are activated according to the part of the body different areas. If you lose a limb, are missing in these areas, the appropriate Feedback.
ZOU