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Updated: Jun 4, 2026
Motor Imagery Brain-Computer Interface in Rehabilitation of Upper Limb Motor Dysfunction After Stroke
Published on: September 1, 2023
Effects of motor imagery brain-computer interface task on quantitative EEG features in patients with prolonged
Zhenzhen Gao1, Zhiwen Zhu1, Shiyan Wang1
1Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medical University (Zhejiang Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine), Hangzhou, China.
Objective:
To analyze quantitative electroencephalographic (EEG) characteristics during Motor Imagery Brain-Computer Interface (MI-BCI) task in patients with prolonged disorders of consciousness (pDoC).
Methods:
Forty-three patients with pDoC due to various brain injuries were enrolled. Based on modified Coma Recovery Scale-Revised (CRS-R) assessments, the patients were divided into 19 in the unresponsive wakefulness syndrome (UWS) group and 24 in the minimally conscious state (MCS) group. All patients underwent 5 min of resting-state (RS) EEG followed by 5 min of MI-BCI task. Relative power, DTABR, and average brain engagement (BE) during MI-BCI were analyzed across resting and MI-BCI states using Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) spectra.
Results:
Mixed-design ANOVA showed significant main effects of condition and group across all EEG frequency bands, indicating clear differences between the RS and MI-BCI conditions and between UWS and MCS patients. Significant group × condition interactions were found in the delta, beta, and gamma bands, as well as in DTABR. Simple effects analysis showed that delta power was higher in RS than in MI-BCI in both groups, with UWS consistently exhibiting higher delta power than MCS under both conditions. In contrast, beta and gamma power were higher in MI-BCI than in RS in both groups. For beta power, UWS was higher than MCS under RS, whereas MCS was higher than UWS under MI-BCI, showing a reversal of the interaction pattern. For gamma power, MCS showed higher values than UWS under both conditions, with a larger between-group difference during MI-BCI. DTABR was significantly higher in RS than in MI-BCI in both groups; however, MCS exhibited higher DTABR than UWS under RS, whereas the opposite pattern was observed under MI-BCI. In addition, during MI-BCI tasks, the MCS group showed greater average BE than the UWS group.
Conclusion:
MI-BCI shows potential as a diagnostic or assessment tool for evaluating the level of consciousness in patients with pDoC.
