Mapping dysfunctional connectivity in brain injury (P02.267)

Structural brain imaging tools fail to detect pathological changes to brain function in the absence of observable structural damage. Identifying areas of dysfunction in brain injury patients could lead to more sensitive and better targeted therapy. This manuscript proposes a novel methodology for using resting state functional connectivity MRI (fcMRI) to identify dysfunctional cortex. The method compares patterns of connectivity within a patient's brain to those in normal control individuals and identifies areas of the individual's brain from which connectivity is abnormal. I present a patient diagnosed with abulia following a large embolic stroke, and demonstrate the results of applying the method on this patient. I additionally present results from three cohorts (putamen stroke, cortical stroke, and healthy controls), as a means of validating the methodology. Analysis of results in the abulia patient identified 18 foci of dysfunction that fall predominantly into the default mode network and the cingulo-opercular network. The putamen/cortex/healthy control study provided negative and positive controls. Healthy individuals generally produced minimal positive results and patients with known areas of damage consistently produced significant values in associated areas. These results are preliminary, but they suggest that fcMRI may provide a tool for identifying and localizing brain dysfunction.
Source: Neurology - Category: Neurology Authors: Tags: P02 Medical Student Essay Award Recipients Source Type: research