Orofacial myofunctional disorder characteristics in cerebral palsy and their treatment methods

Relevance. The variety of clinical manifestations of orofacial myofunctional disorders in cerebral palsy determines the need to improve diagnosis and treatment approaches. According to the authors, the planning of rehabilitation measures for children with cerebral palsy and orofacial pathology should be individual.Materials and methods. 120 children (mean age 8.7 years) with cerebral palsy and orofacial myofunctional disorders participated in the study with subsequent assessment of dental and neurological statuses during treatment, prevention and rehabilitation.Results. The study established correlations between general motor pathology, malocclusion and changes in the speech organs depending on the clinical form of cerebral palsy. Spastic dysarthria and anarthria were detected in 82 cases, age-appropriate speech and language development - in 38. Occlusion assessment revealed malocclusion in 88 subjects, neutral occlusion – in 32.Conclusions. Modern approaches to the treatment of malocclusion and orofacial myofunctional disorders in children with cerebral palsy allow increasing the effectiveness and quality of rehabilitation, organizing the sequence and continuity of specialist actions in a multidisciplinary rehabilitation team.

Enriched Rehabilitation Improves Gait Disorder and Cognitive Function in Parkinson’s Disease: A Randomized Clinical Trial

Background: Studies on non-pharmacological strategies for improving gait performance and cognition in Parkinson’s disease (PD) are of great significance. We aimed to investigate the effect of and mechanism underlying enriched rehabilitation as a potentially effective strategy for improving gait performance and cognition in early-stage PD.Methods: Forty participants with early-stage PD were randomly assigned to receive 12 weeks (2 h/day, 6 days/week) of enriched rehabilitation (ER; n = 20; mean age, 66.14 ± 4.15 years; 45% men) or conventional rehabilitation (CR; n = 20; mean age 65.32 ± 4.23 years; 50% men). In addition, 20 age-matched healthy volunteers were enrolled as a control (HC) group. We assessed the general motor function using the Unified PD Rating Scale—Part III (UPDRS-III) and gait performance during single-task (ST) and dual-task (DT) conditions pre- and post-intervention. Cognitive function assessments included the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), the Symbol Digit Modalities Test (SDMT), and the Trail Making Test (TMT), which were conducted pre- and post-intervention. We also investigated alteration in positive resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC) of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) in participants with PD, mediated by ER, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).Results: Compared with the HC group, PD participants in both ER and CR groups performed consistently poorer on cognitive and motor assessments. Significant improvements were observed in general motor function as assessed by the UPDRS-III in both ER and CR groups post-intervention. However, only the ER group showed improvements in gait parameters under ST and DT conditions post-intervention. Moreover, ER had a significant effect on cognition, which was reflected in increased MoCA, SDMT, and TMT scores post-intervention. MoCA, SDMT, and TMT scores were significantly different between ER and CR groups post-intervention. The RSFC analysis showed strengthened positive functional connectivity between the left DLPFC and other brain areas including the left insula and left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG) post-ER.Conclusion: Our findings indicated that ER could serve as a potentially effective therapy for early-stage PD for improving gait performance and cognitive function. The underlying mechanism based on fMRI involved strengthened RSFC between the left DLPFC and other brain areas (e.g., the left insula and LIFG).

Impairment of stability and gait in elderly patients of a social inpatient institution of the Kyrgyz Republic

Objectives to study the frequency of impairments of the ability to move in elderly patients care recipients of a social inpatient institution of the Kyrgyz Republic. Material and methods. We examined 88 inmates of a social inpatient institution, among them there were 47 (53,4%) men and 41 (46,6%) women aged 65 to 74 years. The average age was 71,96,4 years. Results. Disorders of general motor activity were observed in 62 (70,55,31%) patients. The violations of stability and walking parameters were more pronounced, they were found in 70 (79,55,04%) and 71 (80,76,31%) patients respectively. When assessing the parameters of stability, the disturbances were observed in all positions; mostly they manifested themselves during the tests for standing with closed eyes (46,64,27; р0,05) and when leaning back (44,33,83; р0,05). Conclusion. A comprehensive geriatric assessment to identify the main geriatric syndromes in elderly patients of residential social institution should become an integral part of the organization of medical care aimed at solving these problems and the subsequent mandatory correction of these disorders.

Performance of Bimanual Finger Coordination Tasks in Speakers Who Stutter

Stuttering is a neurodevelopmental speech disorder characterized by the symptoms of speech repetition, prolongation, and blocking. Stuttering-related dysfluency can be transiently alleviated by providing an external timing signal such as a metronome or the voice of another person. Therefore, the existence of a core motor timing deficit in stuttering has been speculated. If this is the case, then motoric behaviors other than speech should be disrupted in stuttering. This study examined motoric performance on four complex bimanual tasks in 37 adults who stutter and 31 fluent controls. Two tasks utilized bimanual rotation to examine motor dexterity, and two tasks used the bimanual mirror and parallel tapping movements to examine timing control ability. Video-based analyses were conducted to determine performance accuracy and speed. The results showed that individuals who stutter performed worse than fluent speakers on tapping tasks but not on bimanual rotation tasks. These results suggest stuttering is associated with timing control for general motor behavior.

THE ROLE OF MOVEMENT GAMES IN THE EDUCATION OF SPEED INDICES IN THE PRE-UNIVERSITY SYSTEM

Exercise games form basic motor knowledge, skills and abilities such as: walking correctly, running economically, jumping and throwing efficiently, while developing the basic motor skills needed in daily life or for subsequent sports. The aim of the research is the possibility to educate the motor quality, speed, through the introduction in the didactic projects of some dynamic and varied movement games at the level of the schoolchildren, which determine an increase of the general motor skills. A good selection of them and properly directed, they present an important means of psycho-physical development of the individual, the formation of motor and volitional qualities, as well as the strengthening of health.

Gymnasts' ability for general motor imagery evaluated by bioelectric sensorimotor rhythms

Introduction: Previous psychological studies using questionnaires have consistently reported that athletes have superior motor imagery ability, both for sports-specific movements and general movements. However, regarding general motor imagery, no physiological studies have demonstrated differences in neural activity between athletes and non-athletes. Gymnasts may be a suitable population for investigating this issue because they are likely to have particularly superior motor imagery ability due to their frequent usage of motor imagery as part of daily practice. Purpose: The purpose of the present study was to examine differences in bioelectric sensorimotor rhythms during kinesthetic motor imagery of general movements between gymnasts and non-gymnasts. Methods: Healthy young participants (16 gymnasts and 16 non-gymnasts) performed repeated motor execution and motor imagery of general movements (wrist dorsiflexion and shoulder abduction of the dominant hand). Scalp electroencephalogram (EEG) was recorded over the contralateral sensorimotor cortex. During motor execution and motor imagery, sensorimotor EEG power is known to decrease in the α- (8-15 Hz) and β-bands (16-35 Hz), referred to as event-related desynchronization (ERD). We calculated the maximal peak of ERD both in the α- (αERDmax) and β-bands (βERDmax) as a measure of changes in corticospinal excitability. Results: ERD magnitude during motor imagery was significantly greater in gymnasts, who subjectively evaluated their motor imagery as being more vivid. In particular, αERDmax was greater in gymnasts compared with non-gymnasts for both motor imagery tasks, whereas βERDmax was greater in gymnasts only for shoulder abduction imagery. Conclusion: We observed gymnasts' signature of flexibly modulating sensorimotor rhythm with no movement, which may be the basis of their superior general motor imagery ability.

Forward-Looking Model Dedicated to the Study of Electric Vehicle Range Considering Drive Cycles

This paper deals with the forward-looking model of an electric vehicle (EV). Various simulation tests have been conducted to investigate the effects of the environmental conditions and powertrain design on the EV driving range. The simulation results show the importance of the forward modeling approach in selecting the EV components such as the battery capacity, the power and torque limits of the electric motor, and the impact of this selection on the EV performance during different driving cycles. The simulation results manifest that the forward model is useful when scaling the battery pack to determine the maximum capacity and selecting the suitable motor power and its size. The characteristics of the General Motor EV1 model have been selected in this study to verify the proposed approach.

The Cortical Organization of Writing Sequence: Evidence From Observing Chinese Characters in Motion

Writing sequences play an important role in handwriting of Chinese characters. However, little is known regarding the integral brain patterns and network mechanisms of processing Chinese character writing sequences. The present study decoded brain patterns during observing Chinese characters in motion by using multi-voxel pattern analysis (MVPA), meta-analytic decoding analysis, and extended unified structural equation model (euSEM). We found that perception of Chinese character writing sequence recruited brain regions not only for general motor schema processing, i.e., the right inferior frontal gyrus, shifting and inhibition functions, i.e., the right postcentral gyrus and bilateral pre-SMA/dACC, but also for sensorimotor functions specific for writing sequences. More importantly, these brain regions formed a cooperatively top-down brain network where information was transmitted from brain regions for general motor schema processing to those specific for writing sequences. These findings not only shed light on the neural mechanisms of Chinese character writing sequences, but also extend the hierarchical control model on motor schema processing.

Cerebellar connectivity maps embody individual adaptive behavior

From planification to execution, cerebellar microcircuits encode different features of skilled movements. However, it is unknown whether cerebellar synaptic connectivity maps encode movement features in a motor context specific manner. Here we investigated the spatial organization of excitatory synaptic connectivity in mice cerebellar cortex in different locomotor contexts: during development and in normal, trained or altered locomotor conditions. We combined optical, electrophysiological and graph modelling approaches to describe synaptic connectivity between granule cells (GCs) and Purkinje cells (PCs). Synaptic map maturation during development revealed a critical period in juvenile animals before the establishment of a stereotyped functional organization in adults. However, different locomotor conditions lead to specific GC-PC connectivity maps in PCs. Ultimately, we demonstrated that the variability in connectivity maps directly accounts for individual specific behavioral features of mice locomotion, suggesting that GC-PC networks encode a general motor context as well as individual specific internal models underlying motor adaptation.