Article

This week Dr. Adkins was absent, so I saw the c-section and read a hefty article. The article talked about neural plasticity. Neural plasticity is the ability the brain has to adopt after a traumatic injury; basically, it's how the brain fixes itself. There were about 10 principles of experience-dependent plasticity in the article. The first principle talked about how if something isn't used, it will go away. For example, if someone doesn't walk for a year, their muscles will deteriorate. Or if someone is in a coma, they might wake up and no longer be able to swallow because that neuron in their brain wouldn't have been used for an extended period of time. In addition, it talks about how something controlled by the motor cortex must be improved and also repeated. Next, when studying the motor behaviors of the post stroke organism, one must take time into account. For instance, if one looks at a rat right after his stroke, he will be extremely, but if one waits for 72 hours, the rat will be more responsive and less sluggish. Lastly, age is another big factor we must take into account. The older the rat is, the harder the rehab and the younger, the easier the rehab. Thus, after this article, I gained a better understanding of the entire stroke and post stroke process.