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Record W4413968317 · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0331360

tACS-combined motor training for the rehabilitation of the upper limb in children and adolescents with cerebral palsy: A randomized, sham-controlled trial protocol

2025· article· en· W4413968317 on OpenAlexaboutno aff
Viola Oldrati, Andrea Ciricugno, Renato Borgatti, Simona Orcesi, Elisa Fazzi, Jessica Galli, Verusca Gasparroni, Luigi Piccinini, Cristina Maghini, Zaira Cattaneo, Maria Arioli, Cosimo Urgesi, Alessandra Finisguerra

Bibliographic record

VenuePLoS ONE · 2025
Typearticle
Languageen
FieldNeuroscience
TopicTranscranial Magnetic Stimulation Studies
Canadian institutionsnot available
FundersFondazione Regionale per la Ricerca BiomedicaRegione Lombardia
KeywordsCerebral palsyPhysical medicine and rehabilitationRehabilitationMedicinePhysical therapyRandomized controlled trialGross Motor Function Classification SystemPsychologySurgery

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

BACKGROUND: Children with cerebral palsy (CP) commonly face gross motor function impairments and manual dexterity deficits, significantly affecting their activity level and independence and, ultimately, quality of life. Rehabilitation often targets improving manual dexterity and activity levels, but standard therapies have limited efficacy. Hence, exploring novel methods to enhance upper limb functionality is crucial. Transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS), by delivering currents oscillating at specific frequencies syncing with the brain's electrical rhythms, has been demonstrated to modulate neural oscillations and motor behavior. METHOD: This randomized, double-blind, sham-controlled, pre-post test study involves 44 children and adolescents (6-17 yo) with CP treated in pairs, which will be randomly allocated to the experimental or control group receiving, respectively, active or sham fronto-cerebellar tACS delivered at the individual gamma frequency. After tACS, both groups will undergo bimanual training, including lower extremities (HABIT-ILE). Primary outcome measures will include the Assisting Hand Assessment, Box and Block Test, and a Visuomotor Task administered via computer for manual visuomotor control evaluation. Secondary outcomes will encompass the Children's Hand Experience Questionnaire, Canadian Occupational Performance Measure, Melbourne Assessment of Unilateral Upper Limb Function, Gross Motor Function Measure, Vineland version 2, Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory, and EEG power recorded in fronto-central regions at rest before (at T0), soon after (at T1), and 3 months after the end of (T2) the training. Safety and tolerability will be assessed by pre- and post-tACS recordings of oxygen saturation and heart rate, along with self-report questionnaires on sensations and side-effects. DISCUSSION: This study investigates whether an intensive HABIT-ILE program combined with fronto-cerebellar gamma tACS can boost training effects on manual dexterity in children and adolescents with CP, while ensuring safety and tolerability throughout the intervention period. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT06372041.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame machine prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.005
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.004
Version: metacan-v3-hybrid-931329e0061cValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Randomized trial · Consensus signal: Randomized trial
GenreCandidate signal: Protocol · Consensus signal: Protocol
Teacher disagreement score0.022
Threshold uncertainty score0.075

Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0050.004
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0030.001
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0080.002
Bibliometrics0.0020.001
Science and technology studies0.0010.002
Scholarly communication0.0010.001
Open science0.0020.001
Research integrity0.0040.003
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0220.003

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.029
GPT teacher head0.268
Teacher spread0.240 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designRandomized trial
Domainnot available
GenreProtocol

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations0
Published2025
Admission routes1
Has abstractyes

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