Stroke is a medical condition that affects the brain and represents a leading cause of death and disability. Associated with drug therapy, rehabilitative treatment is essential for promoting recovery. In the present work, we report an EEG-based study concerning a left ischemic stroke patient affected by conduction aphasia. Specifically, the objective is to compare the brain functional connectivity before and after an intensive rehabilitative treatment. The analysis was performed by means of local and global efficiency measures related to the execution of three tasks: naming, repetition and reading. As expected, the results showed that the treatment led to a balancing of the values of both parameters between the two hemispheres since the rehabilitation contributed to the creation of new neural patterns to compensate for the disrupted ones. Moreover, we observed that for both name and repetition tasks, shortly after the stroke, the global and local connectivity are lower in the affected lobe (left hemisphere) than in the unaffected one (right hemisphere). Conversely, for the reading task, global and local connectivity are higher in the impaired lobe. This apparently contrasting trend can be due to the effects of stroke, which affect not only the site of structural damage but also brain regions belonging to a functional network. Moreover, changes in network connectivity can be task-dependent. This work can be considered a first step for future EEG-based studies to establish the most suitable connectivity measures for supporting the treatment of stroke and monitoring the recovery process.

Effect of Rehabilitation on Brain Functional Connectivity in a Stroke Patient Affected by Conduction Aphasia / Dattola, S.; La Foresta, F.. - In: APPLIED SCIENCES. - ISSN 2076-3417. - 12:12(2022), p. 5991. [10.3390/app12125991]

Effect of Rehabilitation on Brain Functional Connectivity in a Stroke Patient Affected by Conduction Aphasia

Dattola S.;La Foresta F.
2022-01-01

Abstract

Stroke is a medical condition that affects the brain and represents a leading cause of death and disability. Associated with drug therapy, rehabilitative treatment is essential for promoting recovery. In the present work, we report an EEG-based study concerning a left ischemic stroke patient affected by conduction aphasia. Specifically, the objective is to compare the brain functional connectivity before and after an intensive rehabilitative treatment. The analysis was performed by means of local and global efficiency measures related to the execution of three tasks: naming, repetition and reading. As expected, the results showed that the treatment led to a balancing of the values of both parameters between the two hemispheres since the rehabilitation contributed to the creation of new neural patterns to compensate for the disrupted ones. Moreover, we observed that for both name and repetition tasks, shortly after the stroke, the global and local connectivity are lower in the affected lobe (left hemisphere) than in the unaffected one (right hemisphere). Conversely, for the reading task, global and local connectivity are higher in the impaired lobe. This apparently contrasting trend can be due to the effects of stroke, which affect not only the site of structural damage but also brain regions belonging to a functional network. Moreover, changes in network connectivity can be task-dependent. This work can be considered a first step for future EEG-based studies to establish the most suitable connectivity measures for supporting the treatment of stroke and monitoring the recovery process.
2022
brain functional connectivity
conduction aphasia
high-density EEG
rehabilitation
stroke
File in questo prodotto:
File Dimensione Formato  
applsci-12-05991.pdf

accesso aperto

Tipologia: Versione Editoriale (PDF)
Licenza: Creative commons
Dimensione 946.99 kB
Formato Adobe PDF
946.99 kB Adobe PDF Visualizza/Apri

I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.

Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12318/128946
Citazioni
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.pmc??? ND
  • Scopus 0
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.isi??? 0
social impact