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About Cognitive Exercises After a Stroke

While regaining 100 percent of your former mental and physical functions is often impossible following a traumatic event like a stroke, regular performance of cognitive drills can help ensure that your brain and motor control abilities regenerate to the best that they are able. Although poststroke therapy used to be limited to just performance of physical tasks, the incorporation of mental drills has been proven effective in maximizing patient prognosis.

  1. Stroke

    • A stroke occurs when blood supply to the brain is cut off, effective suffocating your neurological center. Strokes widely vary in severity, ranging from life-threatening to so mild that the individual is unaware that something is amiss. This oxygen deprivation can occur when a blood clot forms, preventing blood from delivering oxygen to the brain, or it can occur when a blood vessel bursts, allowing blood to leak into the brain.

    General Treatment

    • The speed with which treatment is received following the initial stroke determines its overall effectiveness. While short-term treatment consists of reversing the event that provided the catalyst for the stroke, long-term treatment involves a combination of physical, speech and mental therapies, including the practice of cognitive exercises, to allow the patient to regain as much functionality as possible.

    Cognitive Exercises

    • Cognitive exercises following a stroke involve any type of mental visualization of motor skills designed to improve execution thereof. According to Dr. Stephen J. Page, a physician at the University of Cincinnati Academic Medical Center, practicing tasks mentally can help to reactivate the body's capacity to perform those tasks optimally. According to a study conducted by Dr. Page published in the April 2007 edition of the medical journal "Stroke," incorporating mental drills along with traditional physical therapy produced superior results to just performing physical therapy alone.

    Performing Cognitive Exercises

    • Performing cognitive exercises is nothing more than thinking through and visualizing a desired outcome. Athletes have been using the technique of visualization for years to improve aspects of their game, so it should not be a huge surprise that the same techniques are equally effective in rehabilitating individuals with impaired motor control.

    Considerations

    • The mind is the key to activating (or reactivating) the central nervous system, so combining these sorts of visualizations with traditional stroke therapy should prove more effective than simply employing physical therapy alone. If you are planning on incorporating cognitive training to rehabilitate yourself after a stroke, understand that you can perform cognitive exercises anywhere at any time, but a quiet environment helps you to maintain focus. Simply close your eyes and imagine yourself flawlessly performing the desired activity. Repeat as many times and as often as you desire.

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