transcranial magnetic stimulation

El marcapasos del parpadeo en un abrir y cerrar de ojos.

Clinical and functional neurological studies have suggested that the motor cortex, M1, does not control facial muscles, mostly the superior ones. Recent studies including current transcranial magnetic stimulation, showed that neural structures related with the cingulate cortex is the main brain region controlling facial muscles in humans. These facts will help clarifying discrepant findings in clinical neurology related to the well known -but not well understood- central facial palsy, among other applications.

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Palabras clave: Corteza cingulada, Estimulación magnética transcraneal, Músculo orbicular de los ojos, Parálisis facial,

Keywords: Cingulate cortex, Facial palsy, Orbicularis oculi muscle, transcranial magnetic stimulation,

Estimulación Magnética Trascraneal en los Retrovirus Humanos: Una Revisión Sistematica Desde 1985 a 2009.

Pyramidal tract is affected in tropical spastic paraparesis (HAM/TSP) and AIDS; the best paraclinic tool so far known to evaluate such involvement, in humans, is transcranial magnetic stimulation. A thorough investigation was done in MEDLINE database for the period between 1985 and 2009, and in Scielo.org between 1996 and 2009 using the terms “HTLV-I, HTLV-II, HTLV-III, HIV; HIV1, HIV2, evoked potential, motor evoked potential, transcranial magnetic stimulation, magnetic stimulation, corticomotor physiology, motor tracts, pyramidal tract, corticospinal tract, myelopathy, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, AIDS, SIDA, tropical spastic paraparesis, HTLV-I associated myelopathy, HAM, TSP, HAM/TSP”. Papers in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Japanese were reviewed. Thirteen manuscripts reporting motor evoked potentials obtained by transcranial magnetic stimulation were identified. In HAM/TSP the pyramidal tract involvement is mainly at low thoracic levels, following a centripetal pattern; in HIV, such involvement follows a centrifugal pattern which is greater at brain level. These findings should allow to redirect neurohabilitation and neuromodulation measures hopefully before fatal outcome or disability take place in these retroviruses-associated neurodegenerative disorders.