The role of task-specific training in rehabilitation therapies.
Task-oriented therapy is important. It makes intuitive sense that the best way to relearn a given task is to train specifically for that task. In animals, functional reorganization is greater for tasks that are meaningful to the animal. Repetition alone, without usefulness or meaning in terms of function, is not enough to produce increased motor cortical representations. In humans, less intense but task-specific training regimens with the more affected limb can produce cortical reorganization and associated, meaningful functional improvements.
Bayona
Nestor A
NA
Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, St. Joseph's Health Care and the University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada.
Bitensky
Jamie
J
Salter
Katherine
K
Teasell
Robert
R
D000818:Animals; D006801:Humans; D009044:Motor Cortex / Q000254:growth & development* / Q000502:physiology; D019957:Motor Skills Disorders / Q000209:etiology* / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D010468:Perceptual Disorders / Q000209:etiology / Q000534:rehabilitation; D000071939:Stroke Rehabilitation; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis