Negative Air Ions (NAIs) as Cognitive Rehabilitation Therapy for Cerebral Palsy Patients

Background: Cerebral Palsy or CP is a group of disorders which can influence various physiological functions, including blood parameters, cognitive abilities, hearing, muscle coordination, movement, oral health, vision, speech, and other metabolic processes.Objective: To evaluate the effects of negative air ions (NAIs) on the cognitive functions of CPinflicted patients.Methodology: This first phase clinical trial involving 28 participants, took place from 1st of February to 30th March, 2021, following ethical approvals from both the institutional ethical board (ibc-2017) and the rehabilitation center (Al Umeed Rehabilitation Association) where the study was conducted.Parental consent was also obtained to include their children in the research.Using a concealed randomization method, the rehabilitation center administration assigned twenty-eight CP-inflicted participants to either control (eleven males and one female, median age 14±5 years) or intervention group (eight males and eight females, median age 14.5±7.1 years).The intervention group underwent thirty-one structured sessions, each lasting 40 minutes, with exposure to 10,000 NAIs/cm3 over six weeks.The assessment of cognitive functions employed five Lumosity games: highway hazards, lost in migration, tidal treasure, masterpiece, and space trace.The data followed a parametric distribution, paired t-test was utilized to assess the within-group comparisons for each cognitive function at both baseline and the sixth week, employing SPSS version 28.Results: NAIs significantly improved information processing (p<0.001),selective attention (p<0.01),spatial reasoning (p<0.01), and spatial fluency (p<0.01) in the intervention group during the sixth week Conclusion: The research findings indicate that NAIs have the potential to enhance cognitive functions in CP-inflicted patients.This improvement is believed to be linked to increased activity in specific brain regions, such as the cerebral cortex, prefrontal cortex, and parietal lobe, as well as the neurotransmitter serotonin.