Facilitation of corticospinal tract excitability by transcranial direct current stimulation combined with voluntary grip exercise

Previous studies have established that transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a powerful technique for the deliberate manipulation of the activity of human cerebral cortex. Moreover, it has also been shown that the non-exhausted voluntary motor exercise increases the excitability of corticospinal tract. We conducted this study to define the facilitation effect following anodal tDCS combined with the voluntary grip exercise as compared with single use of tDCS or voluntary grip exercise. Our result showed that the combination of anodal tDCS with voluntary grip exercise produced a 2-fold increase in the amplitude of MEP as compared with single use of anodal tDCS or voluntary grip exercise. In conclusion, our result could indicate that the treatment outcomes of brain and neurorehabilitation using tDCS would be better when tDCS is combined with the appropriate method of voluntary exercise as compared with single use of tDCS.