??? Will this change your paradigm?

[JasonE]

If the body is able to function (mostly) normally despite the spinal cord being severed from the brain, how does that impact the current paradigm underlying Simple Contact and DNM?

Here's the article that inspired the question:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php...show_article=1

[Barrett Dorko]

I'm unsure how "the paradigm" of Simple Contact might be stated in a way that precludes the possibility of these findings.

It occurs to me that ideomotion (catalyzed by Simple Contact) is significantly restricted in its full expression by the culture and that can hardly be considered reasonably when looking at rats.

Anyway, my primary interest has always been in movements that reduce mechanical deformation in the nervous tissue, or, more properly, resolution of the abnormal neurodynamic. This study doesn't touch upon these subjects, of course.

Thanks for keeping your eyes open Jason. That's the main reason Soma Simple remains unique and so valuable.

[Jon Newman]

Jason,

Do you have a link to the original article. I searched around and found a variety of papers by the author but I couldn't tell which study the news article was referencing. I think there is interesting stuff to discuss here but I have to take issue with the conditional "If the body is able to function (mostly) normally despite the spinal cord being severed from the brain" as the body is clearly not able function normally.

I expect technology will be available that will make it possible for people with SCIs in particular and mobility problems in general even more able to participate in goal directed access to their environments. However, the rhetorical devices used in this article make me a little mad as they tend to oversell the advancements and relevance to what it is people are really hoping for. For example, was the picture of a mouse walking in a tube one of the experimental animals doing normal everyday mousy things? Obviously, that is a tangent and not related to any point you were trying to raise. I was just celebrating Festivus in October.

[Frédéric]

In these paralysed rodents, there is still some processing done by the CNS. The spinal cord is still in the CNS even when disconnected from the brain. It definitively takes aways any locus of control over the mvts. The brain may be deprived of sensation from the denerved limb but the CNS at the cord level still has access to the stimuli and apparently can still act upon these stimuli in a more reflexive manner but which can still be adapted through neuroplasticity changes.

Simple contact and DNM are mostly technics aimed at pain reduction. The sensations from the painful areas are used to decreased threath level and/or mechanical deformation and thus decrease the painful experience. In a situation such as the one in the study presented, any pain felt by the rodent will not be because of mechanical deformation since the rodent's brain will not be made aware of it. I think that any motor activity reflexively created by a noxious stimuli (strong enough to provoke a reflex) on the paralysed limb could still hypotheticaly be affected by DNM.

To me the article is not challenging DNM or Simple contact. It simply re-enforces the fact that the brain is not the only area in the CNS where processing of the information is being done. It also highlights the fact that neuroplasticity can happen without the brain's influence by a simple reflexive/automatic mechanism occuring at a lower level of processing.

[Frédéric]

Even more, it gives us an idea as to how much (more) neuroplasticity could be happening in a normal spinal cord on someone with chronic pain.

[Diane]

The pattern generators for human movement are mostly in the brainstem, as I recall. (Therefore people who are sound asleep can still do things like sleepwalk, drive cars, perform other complex motor programs, even while sound asleep.) I don't know where pattern generators are for rats. Maybe they are at more spinal levels.

This will be interesting - seeing if these "chips" can help human spinal cord injured people!

As far as DNM etc goes, the internal regulation system is functional at four levels, supratentorial, posteror fossa, spinal and peripheral. At the moment I'm learning all these four levels and hypothesizing what the effects of DNM might be at all four. I think it can be hypothesized that it has effect at all four, in intact nervous systems.

I've never had the opportunity to try DNM on anyone with a spinal cord injury, so I have no (concrete) idea how it would affect them. I don't have a clue about neurorehab anymore, I've been so long away from it. I do recall, though, that every spinal cord injury is different - aside from level of lesion there is also degree of lesion. Some of the pathways in the cord are sometimes spared or else slightly sheared while others are severed, or else grossly sheared. So there might be differing effects depending.

[norton]

Originally Posted by Barrett Dorko

I'm unsure how "the paradigm" of Simple Contact might be stated in a way that precludes the possibility of these findings.

It occurs to me that ideomotion (catalyzed by Simple Contact) is significantly restricted in its full expression by the culture and that can hardly be considered reasonably when looking at rats.

Anyway, my primary interest has always been in movements that reduce mechanical deformation in the nervous tissue, or, more properly, resolution of the abnormal neurodynamic. This study doesn't touch upon these subjects, of course.

Thanks for keeping your eyes open Jason. That's the main reason Soma Simple remains unique and so valuable.

2)"Ideomotor movement is secondary to thought, and it begins in the cerebrum".

How does this statement corespond with the response you gave above?
I am also trying to learn more of this fascinating treatment concept.

Deb

[Barrett Dorko]

Deb,

The movement has been planned, but its manifestation is isometric, not isotonic - thus the hardening of the muscle felt by the patient as a "knot" and to certain therapists as "tightness" or "spasm."

They've both misinterpreted what they sense because they don't understand the deep model.