STUDY PROTOCOL article
Front. Hum. Neurosci.
Sec. Brain Imaging and Stimulation
Volume 19 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2025.1661790
This article is part of the Research TopicCognitive enhancement by brain stimulation techniquesView all 5 articles
Targeting the Parietal Memory Network with tDCS in MCI: Study Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Neurology and Neuroscience, Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University, Antalya, Türkiye
- 2Department of Neurology and Neuroscience, Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat Universitesi, Alanya, Türkiye
- 3Department of Neurology and Neuroscience, Istanbul Medipol Universitesi, Fatih, Türkiye
- 4SciLifeLab, Stockholm, Sweden
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ABSTRACT Background: Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a critical transitional stage in dementia related disorders. In that context, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), and lateral parietal cortex (LPC) are subjected to neuropathological changes in MCI. Furthermore, alterations in parietal memory network (PMN) integrity and default mode network (DMN) also occur in MCI. Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a promising neuroprotective tool that might interfere with cognitive decline in Alzheimer's disease-MCI (aMCI) and Parkinson's disease-MCI (PD-MCI) when applied to DLPFC or LPC separately. Method: This is a randomized and controlled study evaluating the effectiveness of tDCS in 120 patients (60 aMCI and 60 PD-MCI). Firstly, all patients will be randomly (1:1) divided into two groups: DLPFC (30 aMCI; 30 PD-MCI) and LPC (30 aMCI; 30 PD-MCI) for tDCS stimulation. Secondly, they will classify randomly (2:1) real and sham groups for tDCS applied to once a day for ten days over two weeks. The stimulation will be delivered with a 2-mA current frequency and will last 20 minutes. The primary outcome assessment for this study will be the change in score from baseline to the end of (14-days and 90 days follow-up) the tDCS application for the neurocognitive tests. Potential outcome parameters will be discussed in the light of current literature to contribute to the new area of personalized non-invasive brain stimulation research in neurodegenerative diseases at early stages. The results of this study are expected to shed light on the neural underpinnings and pro-cognitive outcomes of tDCS. Potential outcome parameters will be discussed in the light of current literature to contribute to the new area of personalized non-invasive brain stimulation research in neurodegenerative diseases at early stages.
Keywords: tDCS, Parietal memory network, Mild Cognitive Impairment, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease
Received: 08 Jul 2025; Accepted: 08 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Cankaya, Akturk, Karakus, Hanoğlu, Mardinoglu and Yulug. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Seyda Cankaya, seyda.cankaya@alanya.edu.tr
Adil Mardinoglu, adilm@scilifelab.se
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