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Background and Objectives: Meditation and mindfulness, rooted in ancient traditions, enhance mental well-being by cultivating awareness and emotional control. It has been shown to induce neuroplasticity, increase cortical thickness, reduce amygdala reactivity, and improve brain connectivity and neurotransmitter levels, leading to improved emotional regulation, cognitive function, and stress resilience. This systematic review will synthesize research on neurobiological changes associated with mindfulness and meditation practices. Materials and Methods: Studies were identified from an online search of PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, and Embase databases without any search time range. This review has been registered on Open OSF (n) GV2JY. Results: Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) enhances brain regions related to emotional processing and sensory perception, improves psychological outcomes like anxiety and depression, and exhibits unique mechanisms of pain reduction compared to placebo. Conclusions: This review highlights that mindfulness, particularly through MBSR, improves emotional regulation and brain structure, reduces anxiety, and enhances stress resilience. Future research should focus on diverse populations and naturalistic settings to better understand and optimize these benefits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objectives: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a non-invasive therapeutic method that modulates cortical excitability and shows promising results for treating disorders of consciousness (DoCs). Robotic verticalization training (RVT) has been shown to enhance motor and cognitive recovery. This study evaluates the effects of an innovative approach combining RVT with tDCS in individuals with DoCs. Methods: Twenty-four subjects with DoCs, particularly those with chronic minimally conscious state (MCS) due to vascular or traumatic brain injury, participated in a quasi-randomized study at the Neurorehabilitation Unit, IRCCS Neurolesi (Messina, Italy). Participants were divided into either a control group (CG) receiving RVT alone or an experimental group (EG) receiving combined tDCS and RVT. Both groups underwent treatments five times weekly for four weeks, with tDCS/sham sessions over the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) lasting 20 min before Erigo training sessions, which lasted 45 min. Results: The findings indicate that combining tDCS with Erigo® Pro RTT could lead to greater improvements in cognitive functioning and P300 latency compared to the CG. Conclusions: These results suggest that the integrated approach of tDCS with RVT could offer significant benefits for patients with MCS, highlighting its potential to enhance cognitive recovery, such as reducing P300 latency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, innovative interactive technologies, such as virtual reality, have emerged as a valuable approach in the rehabilitation of aphasia. Indeed, they offer the opportunity to practice activities that are not or cannot be usually carried out within the clinical environment, and that are aimed at increasing cognitive and motor domains. The aim of this study was to investigate the efficacy and the long-term effects of the BTS-Nirvana, a rehabilitative device that uses semi-immersive virtual reality in the treatment of chronic post-stroke aphasia. Thirty patients with non-fluent aphasia due to first ever ischemic stroke (mean ± SD age: 51.2 ± 11.3 years) were enrolled in this study and randomized into either a control group (n = 15) undergoing conventional speech and cognitive training or an experimental group (n = 15) receiving the same amount of training using BTS-Nirvana. The "Esame Neuropsicologico per l'Afasia" (ENPA) subtests (repetition, reading, naming, writing, and calculation) and the Token test were the main outcome measures. After the training (T1), the experimental group achieved a greater improvement in Token test, reading, naming, and calculation than the control group. Notably, these positive outcomes were maintained at the 6-month follow-up (T2). These results support previous findings that virtual reality can be considered a useful complementary treatment to potentiate functional recovery of speech ability in patients affected by post-stroke aphasia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This pilot study aimed to evaluate whether and to what extent cybersickness (CS) may affect a rehabilitation program using the Computer-assisted Rehabilitation Environment (CAREN), a virtual reality (VR) computer-assisted device for clinical rehabilitation. The study was carried out on 30 subjects, 15 patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD) and 15 healthy controls (HC), which underwent a set of four exergames programmed by our team for PD rehabilitation training. All participants completed the Motion Sickness Susceptibility Questionnaire Short-form (MSSQ) before the training and the Motion Symptoms Assessment Questionnaire (MSAQ) immediately after a single CAREN session. Overall, mean MSAQ scores remained low after the session, suggesting that the users did not experience severe discomfort. We found no significant difference in MSAQ scores between the two groups, while there was a statistically significant difference for the subsection of MSAQ regarding the peripheral symptoms (i.e. sweating, cold sweating, feeling warm), which were higher in HC. Moreover, the results highlighted some correlation between MSSQ and MSAQ. Gastrointestinal symptoms in PD, as well as MSSQ and sopite-related symptoms in HC, were also correlated with susceptibility to CS. As CS is rarely reported after CAREN, this and similar devices may be considered comfortable and safe for patients' rehabilitation involving VR training, including PD persons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]