Publications by authors named "Lauran Cole"

Background And Objectives: Perinatal arterial ischemic stroke (PAIS) is a focal vascular brain injury presumed to occur between the fetal period and the first 28 days of life. It is the leading cause of hemiparetic cerebral palsy. Multiple maternal, intrapartum, delivery, and fetal factors have been associated with PAIS, but studies are limited by modest sample sizes and complex interactions between factors.

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Background And Objectives: Neonatal brain injury is a common and devastating diagnosis conferring lifelong challenges for children and families. The role of mechanical forces applied to the head, often referred to as "birth trauma," are often considered although evidence for this association is lacking. The objective of this study was to investigate the association between common types of neonatal brain injury and scalp swelling using a novel method to quantify scalp swelling as an unbiased proxy for mechanical forces applied to the head.

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Background: Tactile processing plays a pivotal role in the early stages of human development; however, little is known about tactile function in young children. An understanding of how tactile processing changes with age from early childhood to adulthood is fundamental in understanding altered tactile experiences in neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism spectrum disorder.

Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 142 children and adults aged 3-23 years completed a vibrotactile testing battery consisting of 5 tasks, which rely on different cortical and cognitive mechanisms.

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Background: Hemiparetic cerebral palsy impacts millions of people worldwide. Assessment of bilateral motor function in real life remains a major challenge. We evaluated quantification of upper extremity movement in hemiparetic children using bilateral actigraphy.

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Conventional transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) and high-definition tDCS (HD-tDCS) may improve motor learning in children. Mechanisms are not understood. Neuronavigated robotic transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) can produce individualised maps of primary motor cortex (M1) topography.

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Introduction: Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) motor mapping can characterize the neurophysiology of the motor system. Limitations including human error and the challenges of pediatric populations may be overcome by emerging robotic systems. We aimed to show that neuronavigated robotic motor mapping in adolescents could efficiently produce discrete maps of individual upper extremity muscles, the characteristics of which would correlate with motor behavior.

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Aim: Some conditions within specific populations are so rare rigorous evidence is unavailable. Childhood hyperkinesis is one example, yet presents an opportunity to examine sensation's contribution to motor function.

Methods: The patient experienced functional difficulty from hyperkinesis as a result of childhood stroke.

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Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a form of non-invasive brain stimulation that safely modulates brain excitability and has therapeutic potential for many conditions. Several studies have shown that anodal tDCS of the primary motor cortex (M1) facilitates motor learning and plasticity, but there is little information about the underlying mechanisms. Using magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), it has been shown that tDCS can affect local levels of γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and Glx (a measure of glutamate and glutamine combined) in adults, both of which are known to be associated with skill acquisition and plasticity; however this has yet to be studied in children and adolescents.

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Mapping the motor cortex with transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has potential to interrogate motor cortex physiology and plasticity but carries unique challenges in children. Similarly, transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) can improve motor learning in adults but has only recently been applied to children. The use of tDCS and emerging techniques like high-definition tDCS (HD-tDCS) require special methodological considerations in the developing brain.

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Transcranial direct-current stimulation (tDCS) enhances motor learning in adults. We have demonstrated that anodal tDCS and high-definition (HD) tDCS of the motor cortex can enhance motor skill acquisition in children, but behavioral mechanisms remain unknown. Robotics can objectively quantify complex sensorimotor functions to better understand mechanisms of motor learning.

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Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) can improve motor learning in children. High-definition approaches (HD-tDCS) have not been examined in children. We hypothesized that primary motor cortex HD-tDCS would enhance motor learning but be inferior to tDCS in children.

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Importance: Hemorrhage into the brain of term newborns often results in major injury and lifelong disability. The clinical epidemiology of neonatal hemorrhagic stroke (NHS) remains undefined, hindering the development of strategies to improve outcomes.

Objective: To characterize the incidence, types, presentations, associated factors, and outcomes of neonatal hemorrhagic stroke.

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