Objective: The purpose was to determine the influence of cerebellar transcranial direct current stimulation (c-tDCS) on motor skill acquisition in Parkinson’s disease (PD).

Background: c-tDCS is a non-invasive brain stimulation technique that has been shown to acutely increase motor performance in young and old adults. Since the cerebellum contributes to PD pathology through increased compensatory activation, excitatory c-tDCS could enhance this process and improve motor function.

Methods: This study was a double-blind, sham-controlled, cross-over experimental design. Twelve individuals with PD participated in two experiments that were separated by a 7 day washout period. Each session involved performance of both a rapid, goal-directed arm movement task (AMT) and a precision grip task (PGT) (practice tasks) performed during either c-tDCS or SHAM stimulation. For the AMT, 4 blocks of 20 trials were performed, whereas the PGT involved matching a target sine wave (target force range: 5-25% of maximum) for 10 trials of 30 seconds each. These two practice tasks were completed over a time course of 25 minutes, which corresponded to the c-tDCS or SHAM stimulation period. c-tDCS was applied over the cerebellum ipsilateral to the primarily affected hand using accepted guidelines (anode 3 cm to the right of the inion, cathode on the ipsilateral buccinator muscle, current strength 2mA). SHAM stimulation was applied in the same fashion using accepted blinding procedures. The dependent variables were endpoint error (AMT) and force error (PGT). Endpoint error was quantified as the final positional error relative to the target, whereas force error was quantified as the average error in force relative to the target force.

Results: There were no significant differences between the two stimulation conditions for either the AMT or PGT.

Conclusions: These findings indicate that a single session of c-tDCS does not elicit improvements in motor skill acquisition in hand and arm tasks in PD. Based on previous research involving tDCS applied to the motor cortex in various populations, c-tDCS may need to be applied over several consecutive days or weeks to elicit improvements in motor performance in PD.

« Back to 2016 International Congress

MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/the-influence-of-cerebellar-transcranial-direct-current-stimulation-on-skill-acquisition-in-parkinsons-disease/