Brain Circuit Remapping in Blind

Abstract

Background: If people dearth something regarding their senses, they mold their brain in accordance with the environs. Researches indicate vision is not always a necessity for the ramification of the brain's cortical organization. Our real endeavor is to channel people if an individual lacks something the brain rewires in a way that the lacking becomes unrecognizable and their other capabilities improve.  

Methodology: This was a cross-sectional study conducted on 80 subjects of age 15-30 years at Liaquat National School of Physiotherapy. Group A comprised of 40 congenitally blind subjects from Dar-ul-sukun and Ida Rieu School for blind and deaf while group B consisted of 40 sighted subjects. Senses of both groups were assessed by smelling, graphesthesia, two-point discrimination, auditory acuity test, foot tap test and sixth sense test. Collected data was analyzed on SPSS version 20 by applying independent sample t-test.

Result: The results showed that the scores of group A outweighed that of group B as all the tests showed a significant mean difference with p-value<0.05. In Foot Tap Test, group A and group B showed a difference of 7.12+0.9 between their mean scores while in Smelling Test, there was a difference of 4.6+1.48. In Touch Test (Graphesthesia), the mean scores showed a difference of 2.5+1.22. Furthermore, there was also a significant difference between the mean scores of Group A and Group B for Discrimination Test, Two Point Discrimination Test, Auditory Acuity Test and Sixth Sense Test.

Conclusion: It can be concluded that the brain has the ability to remold itself according to the milieu. Moreover, this reorganization can also be done without deprivation by repetitive trials to augment specific functions.