Effect of Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation on Language in Alzheimer's Disease

January 8, 2014 updated by: Gayatri Devi, MD, The New York Memory Services

Open-label, Exploratory Study of the Efficacy of Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation on Naming and Verbal Fluency in Patients With Alzheimer's Disease With Functional Imaging Correlates

The investigators wish to investigate the efficacy of targeted repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) on expressive language in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). In rTMS, magnetic pulses are used to noninvasively stimulate focal areas of cortex of about a square centimeter in area. rTMS has been approved in the United States for the diagnosis of peripheral nerve conditions.

Depending on the frequency of stimulation, rTMS can preferentially stimulate or inhibit cortical areas. In stroke rehabilitation, for example, inhibition of the contralateral, uninvolved hemisphere by low frequency rTMS has improved movement of the affected limbs because of less aberrant inhibition of the affected hemisphere by the healthy hemisphere. The effects of rTMS has also been investigated and found to be useful in treating refractory depression and depression in Parkinson's disease. In addition, rTMS has improved naming in patients with Alzheimer's disease and has improved cognitive abilities and memory in non-demented older adults. Two studies found that rTMS improved aphasia in patients with stroke. While these studies are small, a review of the literature suggests that there may be a beneficial role for rTMS in patients with chronic neurological conditions. In addition, rTMS appears to be well tolerated, with transient headaches being the most common side effect.

In this small open label study, the investigators wish to investigate the usefulness of bilateral stimulation of the brain region termed the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) in patients with AD who have naming and language deficits.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

Subjects for this study will be recruited from Dr. Devi's clinical practice. Eligible subjects must have a diagnosis of possible or probable Alzheimer's disease using NINCDS-ADRDA criteria. The patient and his or her legally authorized representative need to be available to sign the informed consent. The assent of the incapable subject will be obtained prior to enrolling the subject in the study.

Once informed consent and assent are obtained, the subject will have a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scan of their brain anytime during the 2 weeks prior to the first study visit. At Visit 1, subjects will undergo a baseline battery of cognitive tests lasting approximately 30 minutes. Subsequently, the subject will undergo rTMS.

During the visit, Dr. Devi will locate the area of the brain to be stimulated and mark that area of the scalp with an indelible skin marker that will wash out over time. In addition, the subjects will be provided with ear plugs to use during stimulation. This process of locating the area to be stimulated will take about an hour and will occur once. Then rTMS will be started and this procedure will take approximately 20-30 minutes (please see the full protocol for a complete description of this process).

Each rTMS stimulation session will last for about 30 minutes, 2 consecutive days a week for 2 weeks. Both immediately prior to the onset of the first rTMS session, and just after the end of the fourth and final rTMS session, subjects will be tested on their cognitive and language skills. These two testing sessions will last 30 minutes each. Subjects will have another fMRI scan anytime during the 2 days after the fourth and final rTMS stimulation session.

Subjects will continue to receive usual care throughout the study period. Any changes to usual treatment will be noted in the study file.

All subjects will be seen again 4 weeks after the final study treatment session and will once again undergo the brief cognitive battery and fMRI scan.

The investigators expect to recruit two subjects at a time for the study and each subject will be enrolled for 5 weeks from the baseline visit.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

12

Phase

  • Phase 2

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • New York
      • New York, New York, United States, 10021
        • The NY Memory Services

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

50 years to 90 years (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Subjects must have a diagnosis of probable or possible Alzheimer's disease, diagnosed using standardized criteria.
  • If subjects are determined by the PI to lack decisional capacity to consent to the study, a legally authorized representative must be available to sign the informed consent on behalf of the subject. In this case the assent of each subject will be obtained as well. If at any time the subject withdraws his or her assent, the subject will be disenrolled from the study.
  • Subjects will score at or below 30 on the 60 item naming section of the Boston Diagnostic Aphasia and/or below 50% on the Controlled Word Association (CFL) Category Naming.

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Subjects newly diagnosed with AD and not yet receiving usual care are not eligible.
  • Subjects must not have pacemakers.
  • They must not have a history of implanted metal objects.
  • They must not have a history of seizures or epilepsy.
  • There must not be any recent history of migraines.
  • There must not be any history of uncontrolled depression.
  • They must not be on any medications that will significantly lower the seizure threshold.
  • Any other medical condition that is judged by the PI to make rTMS unsafe for the subject.

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Treatment
  • Allocation: N/A
  • Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation
Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Coil Stimulation (rTMS) treatment in Alzheimer's disease. The Magstim Rapid2 stimulator with a peak magnetic field of 0.5-3.5 Tesla at 100% output was used over the right and left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Patients received 4 sessions of rTMS over 2 weeks, lasting approximately 30 minutes, 2 consecutive days a week for 2 weeks.
Device: Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Coil Stimulation (rTMS)
The first six patients were administered rTMS at 10Hz in 20 trains of 5 seconds with 20 second intervals between trains in each hemisphere. The total number of pulses for each session was set at 1000 pulses. The second six enrolled patients were administered rTMS at 15 Hz in 20 trains of 5 seconds with 25 second intervals between trains in each hemisphere.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Cognitive Assessment Task Scores Before, During and After rTMS.
Time Frame: 6 weeks

Cognitive assessment tasks - Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Examination (BDAE), CFL Category naming (CFL), Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) - were administered and scored according to standard procedures before, during and 4 weeks after rTMS.

Higher scores are associated with better cognition; No absolute cut-offs were used here as the outcomes were not categorically assessed.

Total possible score ranges by test, lowest to highest:

BDAE - 0 to 15 CFL - 0 to 62 MMSE - 0 to 30 Full range data and means presented below represents range of scores at 4-weeks post-rTMS treatments.
6 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

The New York Memory Services

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Gayatri Devi, MD, The New York Memory Services

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start

December 1, 2008

Primary Completion (Actual)

December 1, 2011

Study Completion (Actual)

August 1, 2012

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

December 24, 2008

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

December 24, 2008

First Posted (Estimate)

December 25, 2008

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimate)

January 28, 2014

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

January 8, 2014

Last Verified

January 1, 2014

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 91913-5

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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