If only it was always this easy! Actually, if only it was EVER this easy. Still, there is nothing like an unorthodox approach to patient-clinician relationships to convince a patient that the feeling they have of their hand is absolutely, 100%, totally, a construction of the brain… and it seems to have caused quite a stir – thanks to Jeisea for the heads ups on BuzzSugar’s Review of House episodes and comments such as ‘…I have to admit, that stuff with the mirror seemed more like magic tricks and not medicine’.
We are currently investigating mirror therapy and other approaches to pathological pain and have undertaken several experiments and clinical trials – I would say the jury is not quite back in, but it certainly looks as though mirror therapy has a role in the treatment of pain and other neurological conditions. Check this out for one resaonably recent review – ‘Mirror therapy is it all it’s cracked up to be?‘. In the next blog post ‘Reflections, imagery, and illusions: the past, present and future of training the brain in CRPS‘, we’re looking more at the role of mirrors and graded mirror imagery in the role of chronic pain.
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Yes a dramatic result! but this is not a camera or mirror trick, mirror box therapy can really produce this kind of result.
Mirror therapy was first described by V.S. Ramachandran, but has since been proven in the treatment of complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) / RSD, and stroke rehabilitation, as well as for hand and foot rehabilitation following an injury or surgery. http://www.mirrorboxtherapy.com is a good place to start; it has lots of information and a link to where you can purchase a mirror box.
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Hey Mike –
thanks for posting on our humble site. There certainly are some impressive anecdotes about mirror therapy and some reasonably robust clinical trials seem to suggest it is helpful for people with phantom limb pain (here). I must say in a couple of hundred amputees with phantom limb pain that I have seen, not one has responded anywhere near as impressively as Dr House’s did. At this stage, I reckon there is something in it but i am not sure exactly what. If you are after a mirror box, Mike’s company sells them, so does NOI . They both seem good. The reflex mirror box (Mike’s) seems lighter and easier to carry around, but i have had a couple where the mirror is bent a bit and slightly convex – this is a problem – one does NOT want the reflected image to look bigger than it really is…(here). The NOI mirror box does not seem to do this, but is a bit less portable.
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