Phantom limb can be removed by means of a jet of water in the ear

Phantom pain or phantom limb sensation absent often found in people who have these body parts lost. It's - well-known fact, but there is another side to the coin: sometimes people feel that their hands and feet are not their own. People may feel like that they have an extra limb, for example, a third arm or leg, or what is called the syndrome of "foreign hands" when there is a feeling that your hands are not really yours.

Such patients often ask doctors to amputate the "extra" hands, and sometimes deny that their limbs - of their own, saying, for example, that an arm or leg is actually owned by the previous patient who has just been released. For some patients a feeling of alienation can be spread on one side of the body - they feel that they are left or right half of them do not belong.

In the long term, doctors recommend specific treatment and medicines to help patients cope with disturbances. But in the short term to patients helps thin stream of cold or hot water from a syringe, directed into the ear. This procedure is called a thermal stimulation of the vestibular apparatus.

The bottom line is that the procedure diverts patients from the discomfort. Effectiveness depends on the water temperature. In addition, the doctor must "guess" at what it is you need ear splash water to remove the sensation of pain or someone else's limb. Such stimulation affects certain areas of the cerebral cortex, is just responsible for pain, speech and social perception.

Interestingly the opposite effect - if a man lost his arm, there was no phantom pains, after the thermal stimulation of pain may occur at a time.

via factroom.ru