facilitation

Enhancement or reinforcement of a reflex or other nervous activity by the arrival at the reflex center of other excitatory impulses. [L. facilitas, fr. facilis, easy]

- Wedensky f. the arrival of an impulse at a blocked zone, enhancing the excitability of the nerve beyond the block and indicating that the neuromuscular preparation distal to the block has been changed even though the enhancing stimulus is not conducted through the blocked zone.

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fa·cil·i·ta·tion fə-.sil-ə-'tā-shən n

1) the lowering of the threshold for reflex conduction along a particular neural pathway esp. from repeated use of that pathway

2) the increasing of the ease or intensity of a response by repeated stimulation

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n.

(in neurology) the phenomenon that occurs when a neurone receives, through a number of different synapses, impulses that are not powerful enough individually to start an action potential but whose combined activity brings about some depolarization of the membrane. In this facilitated state any small additional depolarization will suffice to trigger off an impulse in the cell.

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fa·cil·i·ta·tion (fə-sil″ĭ-taґshən) [L. facilis easy] 1. the promotion or hastening of any natural process; the reverse of inhibition. 2. in neurophysiology, the effect of a nerve impulse acting across a synapse, resulting in increased postsynaptic action potential of subsequent impulses in that nerve fiber or in other convergent nerve fibers.