Stimulation procedures
rTMS was performed using a CCY‐1 stimulator (Wuhan Yiruide Company Ltd, CH). TMS was delivered through a figure‐eight focal coil with a posterior–anterior (PA, coil handle 45° to the midline) coil orientation. Each patient underwent a session of 8000 stimuli delivered in 400 trains of 20 Hz rTMS at 90% of resting motor threshold (RMT). Each train lasted 1 s with a 2 s inter train pause. The total time of intervention was 20 min.Before treatment, the patient was in a lying position, and the surface EMG electrode was placed on the abductor pollicis brevis (APB) on the affected side using Ag‐AgCl surface electrodes (with a 10‐mm diameter). EMG signals were amplified and filtered (5–2000 Hz) with a bioamplifier at a sampling rate of 5 kHz. The optimal position of the stimulation coil for the experimental group was determined according to the highest motor evoked potential (MEP). The RMT was determined at the minimum stimulus intensity required to elicit MEP at least 50 mV peak‐to‐peak amplitude above the background EMG activity in at least 5 of 10 consecutive trials in the relaxed APB muscle. In addition, for the control group, the position of the stimulation coil was placed at the left DLPFC in the injured side (position F3 of the 10/20 international electroencephalography system). In the placebo group, the position of the stimulation coil was the same as that in the test group, but the surface of the coil was perpendicular to the 45° angle plane of the scalp tangent of the patient's stimulation target point. Therefore, the patients could hear the sound of magnetic stimulation without the magnetic field being pulsed into the patients' brains.