Department of Neurology, The First Affiliated Hospital, Guangxi Medical University, Nanning 530021, China.
Epilepsy Res. 2012 Jun;100(1-2):67-73. doi: 10.1016/j.eplepsyres.2012.01.006. Epub 2012 Feb 2.
Patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) often suffer from cognitive deficits. However, it remains elusive whether the performance of TLE patients in the attentional networks test (ANT) is impaired. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) can accurately reflect the hemodynamics and functional activities in certain regions of the brain. In the current study, we aimed to investigate the characteristics and neural mechanisms of the functions of the alertness network in patients with TLE using the ANT and fMRI. A total of 12 patients with TLE and 8 healthy controls underwent the ANT behavioral tests and subsequent block-design fMRI scanning. The results showed that the response times of the alertness network had no significant difference between the TLE group and the healthy control group. The fMRI data showed that the activation of the cerebellum, right occipital lobe, right frontal and brainstem was significantly weaker in TLE patients than in healthy control. Our data indicate that despite neuropsychological test performance is normal; the alerting network is deficient in the TLE patients. The decreased activation of brain regions of right occipital lobe, cerebellum, right frontal lobe, brain stem and temporal lobe may be the neural basis of altering network impairment in TEL patients.
颞叶癫痫（TLE）患者常伴有认知功能障碍。然而，TLE 患者在注意网络测试（ANT）中的表现是否受损仍不清楚。功能磁共振成像（fMRI）可以准确反映大脑特定区域的血流动力学和功能活动。在本研究中，我们旨在使用 ANT 和 fMRI 研究 TLE 患者警觉网络功能的特征和神经机制。共 12 例 TLE 患者和 8 名健康对照者接受了 ANT 行为测试和随后的块设计 fMRI 扫描。结果显示，TLE 组和健康对照组的警觉网络反应时间无显著差异。fMRI 数据显示，TLE 患者小脑、右侧枕叶、右侧额叶和脑干部位的激活明显低于健康对照组。我们的数据表明，尽管神经心理学测试表现正常，但 TLE 患者的警觉网络存在缺陷。右侧枕叶、小脑、右侧额叶、脑干部位和颞叶等脑区的激活减少可能是 TEL 患者网络功能改变的神经基础。
