BEATS: Brainwave Entrainment and Stimulation

Introduction

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and anxiety areis often treated with exposure therapy. Repeated exposure to the trauma memory in a safe environment decreases anxiety and stress reactions. Intense negative emotions and associations with the trauma are gradually adjusted, or 'updated'. The extent to which this 'memory update' gets properly consolidated in memory plays an important role in treatment success. This memory process can potentially be improved using electrical brain stimulation. How exactly does that work? And does brain stimulation help to increase the effectiveness of exposure therapy for PTSD? These are the main questions were are investigating in this project.

Project Overview

Objective:

To investigate whether brain stimulation with a mild, non-invasive technique (transcranial alternating current stimulation) during exposure therapy has a positive effect on memory, brain activity, and PTSD and anxiety treatment success.

Target population:

People with a uniformed profession or post-active veterans who receive treatment for trauma or anxiety symptoms. 

Timeframe:

The study started in 2024 and is expected to run until 2027

Results:

As a first step, a pilot study was conducted among healthy volunteers. During a short memory task, the frontal cortex was stimulated with alternating current stimulation in a theta rhythm (5 Hz). The results showed that the brain stimulation amplified memory-related brain activity (theta waves, 4-7 Hz), although memory task performance did not yet show significant effects of the stimulation. In follow-up studies, we focus on the application of alternating current stimulation as add-on intervention during exposure treatment for PTSD, and on new ways to increase the effectiveness of this brain stimulation technique.The first results of this study are expected at the end of 2027.