Kim Hyuna, Kang Dahyun, Jang Yong Hun, Ahn Ja-Hye, Won Sojin, Lee Hyun Ju, Kim Johanna Inhyang
Department of Translational Medicine, Hanyang University Graduate School of Biomedical Science and Engineering, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, United States.
Front Integr Neurosci. 2025 May 21;19:1591465. doi: 10.3389/fnint.2025.1591465. eCollection 2025.
Symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are closely associated with impaired executive function. Medication is the first-line treatment for ADHD, yet its effects on brain function and structure remain unclear. To investigate medication-related brain alterations in children with ADHD, we used functional near-infrared spectroscopy, which captures cortical hemodynamic activity, and structural magnetic resonance imaging, which measures subcortical volume.
We investigated the differences in brain hemodynamic activity between 23 children with ADHD taking medication and 22 children who were not taking medication.
Compared with the medicated ADHD group, the unmedicated ADHD group showed significantly reduced activation in the left rostrolateral prefrontal cortex (channel 9, = 0.01; channel 13, = 0.02) and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (channel 14, = 0.01). The unmedicated group also exhibited a negative correlation between oxygenated hemoglobin and symptom severity, whereas the medicated group showed a positive correlation. Furthermore, abnormal asymmetry of the thalamic volume was reduced in the medicated group compared to the unmedicated group.
These findings suggest that increased prefrontal activation and reduced thalamic asymmetry may reflect medication-related improvements in inhibitory control in children with ADHD.
注意力缺陷多动障碍（ADHD）的症状与执行功能受损密切相关。药物治疗是ADHD的一线治疗方法，但其对脑功能和结构的影响仍不清楚。为了研究ADHD儿童与药物相关的脑改变，我们使用了可捕捉皮层血流动力学活动的功能近红外光谱技术以及测量皮层下体积的结构磁共振成像技术。
我们调查了23名正在服药的ADHD儿童与22名未服药的ADHD儿童之间脑血流动力学活动的差异。
与服药的ADHD组相比，未服药的ADHD组在左侧额前外侧皮层（通道9，P = 0.01；通道13，P = 0.02）和额背外侧皮层（通道14，P = 0.01）的激活明显减少。未服药组的氧合血红蛋白与症状严重程度之间也呈负相关，而服药组呈正相关。此外，与未服药组相比，服药组丘脑体积的异常不对称性有所降低。
这些发现表明，前额叶激活增加和丘脑不对称性降低可能反映了ADHD儿童与药物相关的抑制控制改善情况。
