Do you have days when you reach for an object and miss, or seem to make a lot more typos than usual? A vertebral subluxation is an area in the spine of altered biomechanical and neurological function, which is treated by chiropractors. Vertebral subluxations alter the sensory feedback from the spine to the brain, and can affect your brain’s ability to blend information coming from other senses, affecting co-ordination and the ability to learn new movements. This project is measuring whether chiropractic care can improve eye-hand coordination, brain function and the learning and performance of complex new movements.
This grant represents an outstanding opportunity to use the equipment recently obtained through a Canada Foundation for Innovation grant to investigate the impact of vertebral subluxations on brain function. In order to understand the source(s) in the brain where the changes occur, the “whole head” 64-channel eego mylab system will be used. The advanced AsaPro software that is part of this system is essential to map the source (areas of the brain) responsible for changes in individual SEP peaks. Without this research, our assertions that chiropractic adjustments have changed the strength of the contribution from different brain areas important for learning new movement patterns, would not be readily accepted by the scientific community. It is also critical to understand if altered sensory input due to the presence of vertebral subluxations is altering cerebellar plasticity, as it is much harder to reverse maladaptive neuroplasticity in the cerebellum than in the cortex. The Eye Link II is the only system with the sensitivity to investigate the role of altered sensory input on multisensory integration and motor performance. If we can show that SCNP individuals have altered cerebellar function, which affects oculomotor integration and motor skill acquisition and retention, it has the potential to provide sensitive biomarkers of people at risk of injury or accident. In our modern world, everyone wants to be smarter, faster and better at performing and learning new skills. If chiropractic can be shown to help achieve this, it will greatly expand the range and number of individuals who would benefit from care, ranging from athletes wanting to improve performance to employers wanting to decrease performance errors to individuals wanting to improve function and well-being at work, home and leisure. This study has a strong focus on the cerebellum because it is so important in learning skilled movement, and has connections to nearly every other part of the brain. If we can provide evidence of the mechanisms by which chiropractic adjustments are improving function it provides a scientific rationale for both maintenance and preventive care.
Grant Value: $80,000
Chief Investigator: Professor Bernadette Murphy – University of Ontario Institute of Technology
Status: Complete
Publications:
- Experimental Brain Research, Volume 240, Issue 7-8, August 2022, P.1911-1919
Sanmugananthan, P.*, Burkitt, J.J.*, Campbell, D*. Cheema, N., Murphy, B.A., Yielder, P. (2022). “The Impact of Subclinical Neck Pain on Goal-Directed Upper Limb Movement in the Horizontal Plane.” Experimental Brain Research (in press). - Cureus, Volume 13, Issue 10, October 2022
Sanmugananthan P, Nguyen N, Murphy B, Hosseini, A. (2021) Design and Development of a Rotating Chair to Measure the Cervico-Ocular Reflex. Cureus 13(10): e19099. DOI 10.7759/cureus.19099
Posters:
- Neural Control of Movement, July 2022. Dublin, Ireland
Ushani Ambalavanar, Nicholas La Delfa, Heather McCracken, Mahboobeh Zabihhosseinian, Bernadette Murphy. Differential Changes in Somatosensory Evoked Potentials and Motor Performance: Pursuit Movement Task versus Force matching Tracking Task.
Presentations:
- Biannual International Society of Electrophysiology & Kinesiology (ISEK XIV) July 2022. Quebec, Canada
Devonte Campbell, Bernadette Murphy, James Burkitt, Nicholas La Delfa, Praveen Sanmugananthan, Paul Yielder. Accepted “The effects of subclinical neck pain on cerebellar processing as measured by the cervico-ocular and vestibulo-ocular reflexes” - Biannual International Society of Electrophysiology & Kinesiology (ISEK XIV) July 2022. Quebec, Canada
Ushani Ambalavanar, Paul Yielder, Heather McCracken, Hailey Tabbert, Bernadette Murphy “Subclinical neck pain leads to Differential Changes in Early and Middle-latency Somatosensory Evoked Potentials and Motor Performance in response to a novel force matching tracking task” - Southern Ontario Motor Behaviour Symposium in partnership with the Centre for Motor Control April 2022. Wilfred Laurier University, Waterloo, Canada
Devonte Campbell, Bernadette Murphy, James Burkitt, Nicholas La Delfa, Praveen Sanmugananthan, Paul Yielder. The effects of spinal manipulation on cerebellar processing as measured by the cervico-ocular & vestibulo-ocular reflexes in a subclinical neck pain population (2022). - Southern Ontario Motor Behaviour Symposium 2023. Virtual hosted by University of Toronto Centre for Motor Control
Praveen Sanmugananthan*, Bernadette A. Murphy ,James Burkitt*, Paul Yielder. (2020) The impact of subclinical neck pain on upper limb vertical goal-directed movements in the dominant and non-dominant arms. - University of Toronto Centre for Motor Control 2023. Virtual hosted by University of Toronto
Rufeyda Cosgun*, Devonte Campbell*, James J. Burkitt*, Paul Yielder. Bernadette A. Murphy (2020) Vestibulo-ocular reflex padaptation appears to be increased in people with sub-clinical neck pain. - Exercise Neuroscience Group Biannual meeting June 2019. McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada
Cosgun, Rufeyda*,Murphy, Bernadette. Development of a protocol to investigate the vestibulo-ocular reflex in sub-clinical neck pain (2019).
Newsletters:
- Article in ASRF newsletter. September 2022
Recurrent neck pain alters brain function and eye-hand coordination and chiropractic care can help reverse the changes.
Clinical Applications of this research:
The work confirms that individuals with SCNP individuals have altered cerebellar function, which affects oculomotor integration and motor skill acquisition and retention. In the future this work has the potential to provide sensitive biomarkers of people at risk of injury or accident. In our modern world, everyone wants to be smarter, faster and better at performing and learning new skills. If chiropractic can be shown to help achieve this, it will greatly expand the range and number of individuals who would benefit from care, ranging from athletes wanting to improve performance to employers wanting to decrease performance errors to individuals wanting to improve function and well-being at work, home and leisure. This study has a strong focus on the cerebellum because it is so important in learning skilled movement, and has connections to nearly every other part of the brain. If we can provide evidence of the mechanisms by which chiropractic adjustments are improving function it provides a scientific rationale for both maintenance and preventive care.