functional recovery

• trauma such as stroke unaffected areas able to adapt for damaged areas. healthy brain areas takeover damaged areas. neuroscientists suggests process can occur quickly and then slow down after weeks/ months. after this point may require rehabilitative therapy for further recovery
• brain able to rewire and reorganise by forming synaptic transmission close to damaged area. secondary neural pathways not typically used to carry out certain functions activated to enable fucntioning as before doidge 2007
• axonal sprouting growth of nerve endings connect undamaged nerve cell to from new neural pathways
• recuitment of homologus area opposite side of brainmeans specific tasks can still be performed
• +rwa understanding process contributed to neural rehabilitation. simply understanding axonal growth encourages new therapies to be tried. eg constraint induced movement repeatedly practise affected, unaffected restrained. shows useful as new interventions need to be made
• research new treatment functional recovery. banjeree 2014 ppl who had TACs with stem cell. all ppl in trial recovered compared to 4% typical recovery. but drew conclusions based on 5pps typical research on functional recovery
• -level education influence recovery rates. scneider 2014 more time ppl spent education taken indication cognitive reserve greater chance of DFR 16yrs education 40%, 10% less than 12. implies ppl brain damage who have insufficient DFR not likely to achieve full recovery#