Citation

Johnson B, Dodd A, Mayer AR, Hallett M, Slobounov S. Brain Imaging Behav. 2018; ePub(ePub): ePub.

Affiliation

Department of Neurosurgery, Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, Hershey, PA, 17033, USA. sms18@psu.edu.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s11682-018-9982-1

PMID

30361946

Abstract

Accurate identification and classification of patients suffering from mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is a significant challenge faced by clinicians and researchers. To examine if there are different pathophysiological responses to concussive injury in different populations, evaluated here comparing collegiate athletes versus age-matched non-athletes. Resting-state fMRI data were acquired in the acute phase of concussion from 30 collegiate athletes and from 30 injury and age matched non-athletes. Resting-state functional connectivity measures revealed group differences with reduced connectivity in the anterior cingulate cortex (p < .05) and posterior cingulate cortex (p < 0.05) hubs of the Default Mode Network in the athletes. Given the known positive effects of exercise on brain functional reserves and neural efficiency concept, we expected less pronounced effect of concussion in athletic population. In contrast, there were significant decreases in functional connectivity in athletes that could be a result of previous repetitive subconcussive impacts and history of concussion.

Language: en

Keywords

Concussion; Default mode network (DMN); Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI); Resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI)