There are a billion nerve fibers in your body that are clumped together in bundles called nerves. These nerves travel inside spinal column and exit through openings between vertebrae. After leaving spinal column, nerves separate into smaller and smaller bundles and travel to every nook and cranny in body. The nerves that exit neck are distributed in shoulder, arm and hand. They travel in a giant nerve group called brachial plexus. The nerve can become entrapped in several places between neck and hand.

Without nerves, you would not be able to see, hear, touch, taste, smell, or feel hot, cold, pain and pleasure. Without nerves, you would be completely paralyzed: muscles would not be able to move, your body would not respond to any of your commands, and you would be a prisoner within your own body.

After a stroke, gait is often disturbed, speech is slurred, one side of face appears droopy, and one leg is stiff, all of which are related to deficiency in brain function. Usually, one side of brain has been affected. To gain back function of areas damaged by stroke, activities must be performed that influence those specific areas of brain. Strokes have traditionally been with treated with pharmaceuticals, but November 1998 issue of “The Journal of Neuroscience” documents that pharmaceutical-based treatment does not work unless coupled with behaviorally based physical change.

There are many non-pharmaceutical treatment modalities that are effective. Examples of these are visual stimulation on one side of visual field, auditory stimulation in one ear, olfactory stimulation through one nostril, eye exercises through one visual plane, specific rehabilitative exercises firing to efficient side, different word games, and different communication exercises. These modalities target specific areas within brain and brainstem to achieve exact amount of stimulation needed. All of these treatment protocols are referenced and scientifically based.