Farnes Nadine, Jacobsen Henrik B, Stubhaug Audun, Vambheim Sara M
Department of Pain Management and Research, Division of Emergencies and Critical Care, Oslo University Hospital, Oslo, Norway.
Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.
Front Psychiatry. 2024 Jul 17;15:1401008. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2024.1401008. eCollection 2024.
Deep rTMS is an increasingly popular noninvasive brain stimulation technique which has shown promise for treating cognitive impairments. However, few studies have investigated the cognitive effects it could exert in patients with chronic peripheral neuropathic pain. Therefore, we aimed to assess the effects of deep rTMS on executive functioning in patients with peripheral neuropathic pain, in a randomized, double-blind crossover trial.
In total, 17 patients were randomly assigned to receive both active and sham deep H-coil rTMS targeting the primary motor cortex. Each treatment period consisted of five daily rTMS sessions. Selected tests of executive functioning from the CANTAB test battery (paired associates learning, stop signal task, spatial working memory and multitasking test) were performed at baseline, and at 1 week and 3 weeks follow-ups.
We did not find any significant interactions between time and treatment for the measures of executive functioning for the patient group, or for patients with reduced cognition compared to normative means.
High-frequency deep H-coil rTMS targeting the hand area of the primary motor cortex and delivered over 5 consecutive days did not improve executive functioning in patients with chronic peripheral neuropathic pain.
https://clinicaltrials.gov/, identifier NCT05488808.
深部重复经颅磁刺激（rTMS）是一种越来越受欢迎的非侵入性脑刺激技术，已显示出治疗认知障碍的潜力。然而，很少有研究调查其对慢性周围神经性疼痛患者可能产生的认知影响。因此，我们旨在通过一项随机、双盲交叉试验，评估深部rTMS对周围神经性疼痛患者执行功能的影响。
总共17名患者被随机分配接受针对初级运动皮层的主动和假深部H型线圈rTMS治疗。每个治疗周期包括每天5次rTMS治疗。在基线、随访1周和3周时，使用剑桥神经心理测试自动化成套系统（CANTAB）中的执行功能测试（配对联想学习、停止信号任务、空间工作记忆和多任务测试）进行评估。
对于患者组，以及与正常均值相比认知能力下降的患者，我们未发现执行功能测量在时间和治疗之间存在任何显著交互作用。
针对初级运动皮层手部区域、连续5天进行的高频深部H型线圈rTMS，并未改善慢性周围神经性疼痛患者的执行功能。
