1. Early alterations of thalami- and hippocampi-cortical functional connectivity as biomarkers of seizures after traumatic brain injury
- Author
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Marina Weiler, Evan S. Lutkenhoff, Brunno M. de Campos, Raphael F. Casseb, Paul M. Vespa, and Martin M. Monti
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Epileptogenesis ,Epilepsy ,fMRI ,Functional connectivity ,Neurosciences. Biological psychiatry. Neuropsychiatry ,RC321-571 - Abstract
The Epilepsy Bioinformatics Study for Antiepileptogenic Therapy (EpiBioS4Rx, project 3) is a prospective multicenter clinical observational study to identify early biomarkers of epileptogenesis after moderate-to-severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). We used a seed-based approach applied to acute (i.e., ≤14 days) fMRI imaging data, directly testing the hypothesis that the presence of seizures up to two years following brain trauma is associated with functional changes within hippocampi and thalami-cortical networks. Additionally, we hypothesized that the network connectivity involving thalami and hippocampi circuits underlying early and late-onset seizures would differ. Approximately 30% of the initial dataset was deemed unusable due to MRI issues. Approximately 50% of the enrolled sample was lost to a 2-year follow-up. After preprocessing the fMRI data, approximately 40% of the follow-up sample had to be excluded from the analysis due to excessive in-scanner movements, as assessed by state-of-the-art quality control protocols. Only 37 patients provided data that was suitable for the seed-based analysis. Despite these challenges, the remaining, high-quality data returned noteworthy findings. We identified specific hippocampi and thalami biomarkers associated with both early and late seizures following TBI (p
- Published
- 2024
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