Results of a recently published Western Australian preclinical study could help clinicians make better informed decisions on the use of non-invasive brain stimulation to treat symptoms in depression and some other neurological disorders.
In shedding light on what non-invasive brain stimulation does to the brain and where changes occur, this research assists in understanding which conditions are most likely to respond well to this form of therapy and which protocols to use.
The study was authored by PhD candidate Rebecca Ong (Perron Institute and The University of Western Australia) and neuroscientist Dr Alex Tang (Perron Institute and UWA) and published in Science Advances, the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s open access multidisciplinary journal.
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) is commonly used to study the human brain and as a treatment for a wide range of neurological disorders, but the neural circuits and molecular mechanisms affected by this form of therapy have been unclear.
“Our preclinical study found that the effect of magnetic brain stimulation is far reaching, affecting multiple neural plasticity mechanisms at and beyond the site of stimulation,” Rebecca Ong said.
“Many more neurological processes were affected than previously thought, and the changes which occurred were specific to individual brain areas and even down to individual brain circuits.”
Dr Tang explained, “By mapping what rTMS is changing in the brain and in which neural circuits, we now have a much better idea of how to apply and interpret effects of rTMS.”
“The knowledge gained could assist in a more optimised and targeted use of rTMS to manipulate neural circuits in clinical and non-clinical populations.”
This work was supported by funding from the Perron Institute, the Sarich family, The University of Western Australia, and an Australian Rotary Health Gail and Bryan PhD Scholarship.