Thalamo-frontal connectivity mediates top-down cognitive functions in disorders of consciousness.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

We employed functional MRI (fMRI) to assess whether (1) patients with disorders of consciousness (DOC) retain the ability to willfully engage in top-down processing and (2) what neurophysiologic factors distinguish patients who can demonstrate this ability from patients who cannot.

Methods

Sixteen volunteers, 8 patients in vegetative state (VS), 16 minimally conscious patients (MCS), and 4 exit from MCS (eMCS) patients were enrolled in a prospective cross-sectional fMRI study. Participants performed a target detection task in which they counted the number of times a (changing) target word was presented amidst a set of distractors.

Results

Three of 8 patients diagnosed as being in a VS exhibited significant activations in response to the task, thereby demonst

SUBMITTER: Monti MM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4336082 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature