BCIwiki (bciwiki.com) — According to research information from Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg, the MINTS study protocol was uploaded to medRxiv on 2026-09-15 and has not been peer reviewed. It proposes using mobile EEG to investigate changes in brain activity, functional connectivity, and upper-limb motor function during intensive home-based motor imagery neurofeedback training in chronic stroke survivors.
MINTS is a prospective, single-group, multimodal intervention study with an across-subjects multiple-baseline design. It plans to include 21 people who are at least 6 months post-stroke and have persistent upper-limb motor impairments. The sequence comprises pre-assessment, a variable-length baseline period, an intervention phase with 14 training sessions, post-assessment, and an exploratory three-month follow-up. Participants will train at home every second day using mobile EEG.
Repeated baseline and training measurements include grip strength, resting-state EEG, motor imagery tasks with and without neurofeedback, and daily-life movement monitoring. Pre- and post-assessments also include comprehensive motor and cognitive testing, stationary EEG, and functional MRI (fMRI). The primary outcomes are resting-state EEG coherence, used as an index of functional connectivity, and motor imagery-related EEG activity, both derived from mobile EEG within the multiple-baseline design.
Secondary outcomes include motor imagery-related activity measured with stationary EEG, fMRI measures of brain activity and connectivity, clinical motor outcomes, and quantitative movement characteristics derived from movement sensors and video recordings. Exploratory work will also examine associations between neural and behavioral changes, lesion-related effects, and the persistence of training-related changes. The protocol was registered in the German Clinical Trials Register on 25 March 2025 as DRKS00036147.