Monthly Archive for June, 2009
What is Proprioception?
Everyone learns in school about the five senses: vision (sight), audition (sound), olfaction (smell), taction (touch), and gustation (taste). These senses are responsible for our interaction with the external world. Additionally, we have several senses that are responsible for our internal functioning. One of the most important internal senses is called proprioception, or position sense. Proprioception affects our lives every moment of every day, and allows us to accomplish complex tasks that would otherwise be impossible. The sense is so fundamental to our functioning that we take its existence for granted.
Who Should Decide the Survivability of Newborns?
Among the most controversial of medical issues is the resuscitation of newborns that are unlikely to survive. The Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (BAIPA), enacted in 2002, and the enforcement guidelines later issued by the United State’s Department of Health and Human Services (DHS) outlined clinical procedures to be used in the resuscitation and care of infants born between 20 and 24 weeks gestation. (A normal, full-term pregnancy is 37 to 42 weeks of gestation.) This act has gained remarkably limited attention, and many neonatologists are not familiar with the act or DHS guidelines concerning its enforcement. A recent study published in Pediatrics suggested that most neonatologists surveyed did not agree with the legislation, but that it did have the power to change medical practice if it was enforced.
Reflections on Plasticity
Neuroplasticity is a relatively new concept for researchers. Up until the 1970s, scientists held firm to the belief that once we exit childhood, our neurons are fixed and we are unable to grow any new ones, except for very select areas of the brain such as the hippocampus where memory is processed. Since that time, new research and tools such as functional MRI have suggested that our brains are constantly being molded and shaped by our experiences, and maintain some degree of plasticity throughout life. Indeed, the works of such pivotal researchers as Michael Merzenich, Ph.D. and William Jenkins, Ph.D. have demonstrated that our brains wish to conserve real estate, and will remap unused portions of the brain lost due to injury so that they can process different information. As an example, if a patient lost their eye due to a traumatic accident, over time the area of the visual cortex responsible for processing that eye would convert and begin processing information for the remaining eye.
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Comments
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- Tamara G. Suttle, M.Ed., LPC: Thanks so much, Richard, for d
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