Affiliation:
1. Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Jeonbuk National University Medical School, Jeonju, Republic of Korea
2. Research Institute of Clinical Medicine of Jeonbuk National University – Biomedical Research Institute of Jeonbuk National University Hospital, Jeonju, Republic of Korea.
Abstract
Background:
Mild traumatic brain injury patients commonly complain headache and central pain, and the pain accompanies depressive mood change. This case study reports the therapeutic effect of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) in mild traumatic brain injury patient with headache and depression through objective serial changes of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI).
Methods:
The 51-year-old man complained of headache and depression despite conventional treatment for 13 months. We applied 15 times rTMS on the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. We checked the pain and depression through numeric rating scale (NRS) and Beck depression inventory (BDI) when admission, discharged, and 1 month after discharge. DTI was performed 3 times; before, during-day of rTMS 6th stimulation, and after-day of rTMS 15th stimulation. Then the reconstructed White matter related to pain and depression was obtained.
Results:
NRS and BDI showed significant improvement and it was maintained 1 year after discharge. DTI-based metrics of the White matters related to pain and depression gradually increased before – during – after rTMS.
Conclusion:
Studies focused on examining changes in pain, depression and DTI-based metrics of White matter are rare. This case is significant in that not only pain and depression improved after the rTMS, but also serial changes in White matter were observed in DTI.
Publisher
Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health)