Journal of neuroimaging : official journal of the American Society of Neuroimaging
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Extending communication for patients with disorders of consciousness.
The difficulty of distinguishing disorders of consciousness from certain disorders of communication leads to the possibility of false diagnosis. Our aim is to communicate with patients with disorders of consciousness through asking them to answer questions with "yes/no" by performing mental imagery tasks using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). ⋯ The results from 2 patients provide independent support of similar work by others with 3 T fMRI, and demonstrate broader clinical utility for these tests at 1.5 T despite lower signal-to-noise ratio. Based on the control results, mental calculation adds a robust imagery task for use in future studies of this kind.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Functional imaging of the cerebellum and basal ganglia during predictive motor timing in early Parkinson's disease.
The basal ganglia and the cerebellum have both emerged as important structures involved in the processing of temporal information. ⋯ We conclude that both the cerebellum and striatum are involved in predictive motor timing tasks. The cerebellar activity is associated exclusively with the postponement of action until the right moment, whereas both the cerebellum and striatum are needed for successful adaptation of motor actions from one trial to the next. We found a general ''hypoactivation'' of basal ganglia and cerebellum in early stage PD relative to HC, indicating that even in early stages of the PD there could be functional perturbations in the motor system beyond striatum.
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Review Case Reports
Intracranial abscess as a complication of allergic fungal sinusitis.
This case involves a common disease, allergic fungal sinusitis (AFS), with the uncommon complication of intracranial abscess. Although AFS is known to result in bone erosion, invasive complications are rare. ⋯ This case illustrates the importance of identifying AFS and describing findings such as sinus erosion that may alter management. In this example, knowledge of the altered anatomy and potential for mucosal injury may facilitate surgical planning and decrease the likelihood of future complications.
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This study aims to investigate the regional changes in the early onset of blindness using the deformation-based morphometry (DBM) method. ⋯ DBM is an effective method for detecting entire brain structural changes in blindness. Visual deprivation actually alters the local structural organization during the early critical periods of neurodevelopment. Volume increases outside the occipital lobe detected with DBM may suggest compensatory adaptations.
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To examine the distributions of proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) observed metabolites in Parkinson's disease (PD) throughout the whole brain. ⋯ PD is associated with widespread alterations of brain metabolite concentrations, with a primary finding of increased creatine. Higher creatine values in our PD sample may reflect greater neuronal energy expenditure early in the disease process that is compensatory. This is the first whole brain MRS study of PD that has examined metabolite changes across a large fraction of the brain volume, including the cortical mantle.