Department of Rehabilitation Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, 11 Yuk Choi Rd, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong.
Institute of Allied Health Sciences, National Cheng Kung University Hospital, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
Eur Arch Psychiatry Clin Neurosci. 2021 Dec;271(8):1445-1453. doi: 10.1007/s00406-020-01193-0. Epub 2020 Sep 17.
Movement slowness, linked to dysfunctional basal ganglia and cerebellum, is prevalent but lacks effective therapy in patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. This study was to examine immediate effects of rhythmic auditory stimulation (RAS) on upper-limb movement speed in patients. Thirty patients and 30 psychiatrically healthy people executed the right-hand task and the both-hand task of the Purdue Pegboard Test when listening to RAS with two tempi: normal (equal to the fastest movement tempo for each participant without RAS) and fast (120% of the normal tempo). The testing order of the RAS tempi for each participant was randomized. Patients had lower scores of right-hand and both-hand tasks than did psychiatrically healthy people. Scores of right-hand and both-hand tasks were higher in the fast-RAS condition than the normal-RAS condition in participants. This is the first study to explore the possibility of applying RAS to movement therapy for patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. The results demonstrated that faster RAS was effective in inducing faster upper-limb movements in patients and psychiatrically healthy people, suggesting that manipulating RAS may be a feasible therapeutic strategy utilized to regulate movement speed. The RAS may involve alternative neural pathways to modulate movement speed and thus to compensate for impaired function of basal ganglia and cerebellum in patients.
运动缓慢与基底神经节和小脑功能障碍有关，在精神分裂症谱系障碍患者中较为普遍，但缺乏有效的治疗方法。本研究旨在探讨节律性听觉刺激（RAS）对患者上肢运动速度的即时影响。30 名患者和 30 名精神健康对照者在听 RAS 时执行右手任务和双手任务，RAS 有两种速度：正常（等于每个参与者在没有 RAS 的情况下最快的运动速度）和快速（正常速度的 120%）。每位参与者的 RAS 速度的测试顺序是随机的。患者的右手和双手任务得分均低于精神健康对照组。在参与者中，快速 RAS 条件下的右手和双手任务得分均高于正常 RAS 条件。这是第一项探索将 RAS 应用于精神分裂症谱系障碍患者运动治疗的可能性的研究。结果表明，更快的 RAS 能有效诱导患者和精神健康对照者更快的上肢运动，表明操纵 RAS 可能是一种可行的治疗策略，用于调节运动速度，从而补偿患者基底神经节和小脑的功能障碍。
