Main
stroke, Ischemic stroke, post-stroke, traumatic
SAID, STROKE, ISCHEMIC STROKE
Ischemic stroke can have devastating consequences to individuals and their families while simultaneously carrying a high social and economic burden. Major advances have been achieved in prevention and treatment of stroke by means of population-health management of risk factors and acute interventions. Innovation and development of new technologies have played a substantial role in improving outcomes in the early hours after insult, including advances in emergency healthcare delivery networks, imaging technologies and medical devices. The same cannot be said, however, for the post-acute phase where, despite substantial effort and investment, technological leaps have been slower. Even with contemporary techniques, up to 50% of survivors experience chronic disabilityNeuroplasticity is a well-documented phenomenon that is associated with gradual spontaneous or therapy-driven improvements in post-stroke motor function. The extent of recovery varies considerably across individuals and is known to depend largely on lesion location and sizeWe have proposed and investigated a new, invasive surgical approach for extending the degree and temporal window of neuroplasticity after ischemic and traumatic insults to the brain. Specifically, the approach involves continuous stimulation of the cerebellar dentate nucleus (DN) to modulate neural activity and ipsilesional cortical excitability through activation of the robust, endogenous dentatothalamocortical pathway (Fig. 