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01-08-2015 | Research Article

Liver transplantation nearly normalizes brain spontaneous activity and cognitive function at 1 month: a resting-state functional MRI study

Authors: Yue Cheng, Lixiang Huang, Xiaodong Zhang, Jianhui Zhong, Qian Ji, Shuangshuang Xie, Lihua Chen, Panli Zuo, Long Jiang Zhang, Wen Shen

Published in: Metabolic Brain Disease | Issue 4/2015

Abstract

To investigate the short-term brain activity changes in cirrhotic patients with Liver transplantation (LT) using resting-state functional MRI (fMRI) with regional homogeneity (ReHo) method. Twenty-six cirrhotic patients as transplant candidates and 26 healthy controls were included in this study. The assessment was repeated for a sub-group of 12 patients 1 month after LT. ReHo values were calculated to evaluate spontaneous brain activity and whole brain voxel-wise analysis was carried to detect differences between groups. Correlation analyses were performed to explore the relationship between the change of ReHo with the change of clinical indexes pre- and post-LT. Compared to pre-LT, ReHo values increased in the bilateral inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), right inferior parietal lobule (IPL), right supplementary motor area (SMA), right STG and left middle frontal gyrus (MFG) in patients post-LT. Compared to controls, ReHo values of post-LT patients decreased in the right precuneus, right SMA and increased in bilateral temporal pole, left caudate, left MFG, and right STG. The changes of ReHo in the right SMA, STG and IFG were correlated with change of digit symbol test (DST) scores (P < 0.05 uncorrected). This study found that, at 1 month after LT, spontaneous brain activity of most brain regions with decreased ReHo in pre-LT was substantially improved and nearly normalized, while spontaneous brain activity of some brain regions with increased ReHo in pre-LT continuously increased. ReHo may provide information on the neural mechanisms of LT’ effects on brain function.

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Title: Liver transplantation nearly normalizes brain spontaneous activity and cognitive function at 1 month: a resting-state functional MRI study
Authors: Yue Cheng
Lixiang Huang
Xiaodong Zhang
Jianhui Zhong
Qian Ji
Shuangshuang Xie
Lihua Chen
Panli Zuo
Long Jiang Zhang
Wen Shen
Publication date: 01-08-2015
Publisher: Springer US
Published in: Metabolic Brain Disease / Issue 4/2015
Print ISSN: 0885-7490
Electronic ISSN: 1573-7365
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11011-015-9657-1

Keynote webinar | Spotlight on medication adherence

Springer Medicine

Liver transplantation nearly normalizes brain spontaneous activity and cognitive function at 1 month: a resting-state functional MRI study

Abstract

Keynote webinar | Spotlight on medication adherence

Springer Medicine

Abstract

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