Cognitive phenotypes in parkinson's disease differ in terms of brain-network organization and connectivity

Cognitive deficits are common in Parkinson's disease and we suspect that dysfunctions of connected brain regions can be the source of these deficits. The aim of the present study was to investigate changes in whole-brain intrinsic functional connectivity according to differences in cognitive profiles in Parkinson's disease. 119 participants were enrolled and divided into four groups according to their cognitive phenotypes (determined by a cluster analysis): (i) 31 cognitively intact patients (G1), (ii) 31 patients with only slight mental slowing (G2), (iii) 43 patients with mild to moderate deficits mainly in executive functions (G3), (iv) 14 patients with severe deficits in all cognitive domains (G4-5). Rs-fMRI whole-brain connectivity was examined by two complementary approaches: graph theory for studying network functional organization and network-based statistics (NBS) for exploring functional connectivity amongst brain regions. After adjustment for age, duration of formal education and center of acquisition, there were significant group differences for all functional organization indexes: functional organization decreased (G1 > G2 > G3 > G4-5) as cognitive impairment worsened. Between-group differences in functional connectivity (NBS corrected, P