title: The dynamic motor imagery of locomotion is task-dependent in patients with stroke.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Recently, Motor Imagery (MI) has been associated with the execution of movements miming in part the mentally represented action (dynamic MI, dMI). Preliminary studies have reported as dMI may improve trainings in sport, with imagery timing close to the physical execution one. This study was aimed to investigate time and spatial parameters of dMI with actual locomotion in people with stroke.
  
  
  METHODS
  Twelve patients (stroke group, SG) were compared with twelve healthy elderly (elderly group, EG) and twenty young adults (young group, YG). Subjects performed mental representations of different walking (forward, FW; lateral, LW, backward, BW), accompanied or not by movements imitating walking (dMI and static MI, sMI). Then, they performed actual locomotion (AL). Outcome measures were related to the time and the number of steps spent for completing the tasks for all the given locomotor conditions.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Significant differences were found in patients with respect to healthy subjects, with time in sMI significantly shorter than in dMI (p < 0.004) and AL (p < 0.002), but not between dMI and AL in FW (p = 0.806). In patients, times obtained in sMI and dMI was significantly shorter with respect to those of AL in LW and BW. Patients performed imagery tasks with similar times in all locomotion. Healthy groups did not reveal differences among tasks in BW, while significant differences were found in LW. Analogous results were found in terms of number of performed steps.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In patients with stroke, a spatiotemporal functional equivalence with AL was found only for dMI, and not for sMI, in forward walking. This could be due to familiarity with this task. These results might have implications for the rehabilitative techniques based on MI.
authors.affiliation: Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome Foro Italico, Rome, Italy.|Clinical Laboratory of Experimental Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS Fondazione Santa Lucia, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Augusto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fusco
authors.affiliation: Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome Foro Italico, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Maria Chiara
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Gallotta
authors.affiliation: Clinical Laboratory of Experimental Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS Fondazione Santa Lucia, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Iosa
authors.affiliation: Clinical Laboratory of Experimental Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS Fondazione Santa Lucia, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Giovanni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Morone
authors.affiliation: Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome Foro Italico, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Luigi
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Iasevoli
authors.affiliation: Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Domenica
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Trifoglio
authors.affiliation: Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Sapienza University of Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Vincenzo Maria
authors.initials: VM
authors.lastname: Saraceni
authors.affiliation: Clinical Laboratory of Experimental Neurorehabilitation, IRCCS Fondazione Santa Lucia, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Stefano
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Paolucci
authors.affiliation: Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome Foro Italico, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Carlo
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Baldari
authors.affiliation: Department of Movement, Human and Health Sciences, University of Rome Foro Italico, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Guidetti
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D019018:Imagery, Psychotherapy / Q000379:methods*; D007092:Imagination / Q000502:physiology*; D008124:Locomotion / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care; D010865:Pilot Projects; D020521:Stroke / Q000628:therapy*
keywords: Walking; dynamic motor imagery; locomotion; locomotor body schema; task-dependent activity