Role of mirror therapy in management of stroke – Current and future perspectives

Abstract

Mirror therapy (MT) is a sort of therapy that makes use of vision for managing pain in persons with amputated limbs or weakness in stroke patients. Mirror treatment works by deceiving the brain by making it appear as though the missing limb or weaker limb is moving while the patient looks at the actual, functional limb in a mirror. By doing this, the brain conceals the fact that the amputated limb itself does not provide any signals of movement. Although very encouraging, MT has notable drawbacks that researchers are desiring and working hard to resolve so that it could be applied in treating more composite movements or pain of several types. Stroke has been the third biggest cause worldwide for the years of life lost (YLL); the age-standardized YLL grew by 12.9% (10.6–15.2) between 1990 and 2007 and by 12.1% (9.9–14.1) between 2007 and 2017. MT is a kind of rehabilitation method where the movement of an unaffected limb creates the illusion that the affected limb is also moving, for which a mirror is positioned amidst the legs or arms.

Keywords

• amputation
• mirror therapy
• pain
• stroke