CHICAGO, Jan. 23 (UPI) -- Bedside stories aren't just for going sleep, they're also for waking up -- from a coma. New research suggests familial voices stimulate the consciousness of comatose patients, shortening recovery time and improving post-coma brain health.
In a study conducted at Hines VA Hospital by researchers with Northwestern University, patients who were played recordings of familiar stories narrated by family members were more likely to wake up sooner and enjoy improved cognitive abilities compared to those who did not hear bedside tales.
"We believe hearing those stories in parents' and siblings' voices exercises the circuits in the brain responsible for long-term memories," lead author Theresa Pape, a neuroscientist at Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine and Hines VA, said in a press release. "That stimulation helped trigger the first glimmer of awareness."
In addition to measuring the length of time before patients emerged from their comas, researchers tested each patient's responsiveness to visual and verbal cues. Coma patients aren't exactly asleep 24-7. In the wake of a traumatic brain injury, patients typically progress from coma to what's known as a minimally conscious or vegetative state.
While these states can last anywhere from a month to several years, they don't prohibit a patient from exhibiting a basic level of awareness -- often using their eyes to communicate, respond to stimuli and track people as they walk across the room.
In before and after tests, patients who listened to familial-read stories four to six times a day scored much higher on testing known as Familiar Auditory Sensory Training (FAST). MRIs showed that oxygen levels to important parts of the brain improved in before-and-after awareness testing.
"This indicates the patient's ability to process and understand what they're hearing is much better," Pape said, referring to patients' improved awareness test scores after six weeks of bedside stories. "At baseline they didn't pay attention to that non-familiar voice. But now they are processing what that person is saying."
The new study was published online this week in the journal Neurorehabilitation.
