Wu Luobing, Wang Caihong, Liu Jingchun, Guo Jun, Wei Ying, Wang Kaiyu, Miao Peifang, Wang Yingying, Cheng Jingliang
Henan Key Laboratory of Magnetic Resonance Function and Molecular Imaging, Department of MRI, The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, China.
Tianjin Key Laboratory of Functional Imaging, Department of Radiology, Tianjin Medical University General Hospital, Tianjin, China.
Front Aging Neurosci. 2021 Feb 18;13:621767. doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2021.621767. eCollection 2021.
Recent neuroimaging studies have shown the possibility of cognitive impairment after pontine stroke. In this study, we aimed to use voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) to investigate changes in the cognitive function in chronic pontine stroke. Functional MRI (fMRI) and behavioral assessments of cognitive function were obtained from 56 patients with chronic pontine ischemic stroke [28 patients with left-sided pontine stroke (LP) and 28 patients with right-sided pontine stroke (RP)] and 35 matched healthy controls (HC). The one-way ANOVA test was performed for the three groups after the VMHC analysis. Results showed that there were significant decreases in the bilateral lingual gyrus (Lingual_L and Lingual_R) and the left precuneus (Precuneus_L) in patients with chronic pontine ischemic stroke compared to HCs. However, in a multiple comparison test, this difference remained only between the HC and RP groups. Moreover, we explored the relationship between the decreased -values in VMHC and the behavior-task scores using a Pearson's correlation test and found that both scores of short-term memory and long-term memory in the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test were positively correlated with -values of the left lingual gyrus (Lingual_L), the right lingual gyrus (Lingual_R), and the left precuneus (Precuneus_L) in VMHC. Besides that, the -values of Precuneus_L in VMHC were also negatively correlated with the reaction time for correct responses in the Flanker task and the spatial memory task. In conclusion, first, the lingual gyrus played an important role in verbal memory. Second, the precuneus influenced the working memory, both auditory-verbal memory and visual memory. Third, the right-sided stroke played a greater role in the results of this study. This study provides a basis for further elucidation of the characteristics and mechanisms of cognitive impairment after pontine stroke.
近期的神经影像学研究表明脑桥卒中后存在认知障碍的可能性。在本研究中，我们旨在使用体素镜像同伦连接性（VMHC）来研究慢性脑桥卒中患者认知功能的变化。对56例慢性脑桥缺血性卒中患者[28例左侧脑桥卒中（LP）患者和28例右侧脑桥卒中（RP）患者]以及35名匹配的健康对照者（HC）进行了功能磁共振成像（fMRI）和认知功能行为评估。在VMHC分析后对三组进行单因素方差分析。结果显示，与健康对照者相比，慢性脑桥缺血性卒中患者双侧舌回（Lingual_L和Lingual_R）及左侧楔前叶（Precuneus_L）有显著降低。然而，在多重比较检验中，这种差异仅在健康对照者和右侧脑桥卒中组之间存在。此外，我们使用Pearson相关检验探索了VMHC中降低值与行为任务分数之间的关系，发现Rey听觉词语学习测验中的短期记忆和长期记忆分数均与VMHC中左侧舌回（Lingual_L）、右侧舌回（Lingual_R）及左侧楔前叶（Precuneus_L）的值呈正相关。除此之外，VMHC中左侧楔前叶的值还与Flanker任务和空间记忆任务中正确反应的反应时间呈负相关。总之，第一，舌回在言语记忆中起重要作用。第二，楔前叶影响工作记忆，包括听觉言语记忆和视觉记忆。第三，右侧卒中在本研究结果中起更大作用。本研究为进一步阐明脑桥卒中后认知障碍的特征和机制提供了依据。
