‘Brain fog’ in people with multiple sclerosis (MS) can be ‘significantly’ reduced by winning money, reveals the first study of its kind.
There are currently no drugs available to treat the much dreaded symptom which is experienced by 50% of people with the neurological disease.
But now a surprising study has found the prospect of monetary rewards when gambling stimulates the area of the brain that controls cognitive problems, which can include poor memory and concentration.
Researchers from the Kessler Foundation in New Jersey and the University Medical Center in Amsterdam made their discovery through brain scans and self-reported symptoms of patients.
‘These findings show that there’s potential for treating cognitive fatigue in MS with noninvasive interventions that provide a goal, such as winning money (as in the current study), for example, or achieving a good score on a test,’ said lead author Dr Ekaterina Dobryakova.
Winning money through gambling can improve cognitive problems in MS patients which is experienced by 50% of people with the neurological disease
MS is an autoimmune disease, which means the immune system mistakenly attacks the insulation around nerve cells (called myelin) in the brain, spinal cord and optic nerves.
Affecting more than 400,000 people in the US and 100,000 in the UK, it is currently considered incurable although disease modifying drugs can reduce relapses.
Brain fog, also commonly known as brain or cognitive fatigue, can be a mild to severe episode of mental confusion that can strike without warning.
Cognitive problems in MS are the result of inflammation and in the brain interrupting the transmission of electrical messages along fibres, reducing the speed and accuracy of the information.
Behavioural interventions work
The research, published in Multiple Sclerosis Journal, notes that previous studies have shown that the frontostriatal circuit of the brain is involved in cognitive fatigue.
In this study, investigators enrolled 14 healthy controls and 19 individuals with MS who all had MRI scans while performing a gambling task.
They were tested under two conditions: ‘outcome’ and ‘no outcome’. For the outcome condition, they were offered the opportunity to win a monetary reward; for the no outcome condition, no reward was offered.
‘We found significant differences in activation between the two conditions in both groups,’ said Dr Dobryakova.
‘With the outcome condition, significant activation of the frontostriatal network was associated with significant reduction in fatigue, suggesting that behavioral interventions that motivate individuals to reach a particular goal may be an effective approach to reducing fatigue.’
MS patients are advised by medics to minimize the effects of cognitive symptoms by adopting organizational strategies and managing their stress and anxiety levels and improving sleep patterns.
According to the MS Trust, a small study showed some improvements in concentration and memory in patients taking gingko biloba supplements but it did not provide enough evidence to show it has a definite effect.
Some of the disease modifying drugs are also being investigated for any potential effect on cognitive function, but again it is too early to draw any firm conclusions about their potential benefits, according to the charity.