Article (Scientific journals)
Brain function in the vegetative state
Laureys, Steven; Antoine, S.; Boly, Mélanie et al.
2002In Acta Neurologica Belgica, 102 (4), p. 177-185
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Keywords :
vegetative state; consciousness; functional neuroimaging; positron emission tomography; brain metabolism, cerebral blood flow; functional connectivity; brain plasticity
Abstract :
[en] Positron emission tomography (PET) techniques represent a useful tool to better understand the residual brain function in vegetative state patients. It has been shown that overall cerebral metabolic rates for glucose are massively reduced in this condition. However, the recovery of consciousness from vegetative state is not always associated with substantial changes in global metabolism. This finding led us to hypothesize that some vegetative patients are unconscious not just because of a global loss of neuronal function, but rather due to an altered activity in some critical brain regions and to the abolished functional connections between them. We used voxel-based Statistical Parametric Mapping (SPM) approaches to characterize the functional neuroanatomy of the vegetative state. The most dysfunctional brain regions were bilateral frontal and parieto-temporal associative cortices. Despite the metabolic impairment, external stimulation still induced a significant neuronal activation (i.e., change in blood flow) in vegetative patients as shown by both auditory click stimuli and noxious somatosensory stimuli. However this activation was limited to primary cortices and dissociated from higher-order associative cortices, thought to be necessary for conscious perception. Finally, we demonstrated that vegetative patients have impaired functional connections between distant cortical areas and between the thalami and the cortex and, more importantly, that recovery of consciousness is paralleled by a restoration of this cortico-thalamo-cortical interaction.
Disciplines :
Neurology
Author, co-author :
Laureys, Steven  ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Centre de recherches du cyclotron
Antoine, S.
Boly, Mélanie ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Neurologie
Elincx, S.
Faymonville, Marie-Elisabeth ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Services généraux (Faculté de médecine) > Relations académiques et scientifiques (Médecine)
Berré, Jacques
Sadzot, Bernard ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Département des sciences cliniques > Département des sciences cliniques
Ferring, Martine
De Tiège, Xavier
van Bogaert, Patrick
Hansen, Isabelle ;  Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Liège - CHU > Neurologie Sart Tilman
Damas, Pierre ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Département des sciences cliniques > Anesthésie et réanimation
Mavroudakis, Nicolas
Lambermont, Bernard  ;  Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Liège - CHU > Frais communs médecine
Del Fiore, Guy
Aerts, Joël ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Centre de recherches du cyclotron
Degueldre, Christian ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Centre de recherches du cyclotron
Phillips, Christophe  ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Centre de recherches du cyclotron
Franck, Georges ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Relations académiques et scientifiques (Médecine)
Vincent, Jean-Louis
Lamy, Maurice ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Département des sciences cliniques > Anesthésie et réanimation
Luxen, André ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de chimie (sciences) > Chimie organique de synthèse - Centre de recherches du cyclotron
Moonen, Gustave  ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Département des sciences cliniques > Neurologie - Doyen de la Faculté de Médecine
Goldman, Serge
Maquet, Pierre  ;  Université de Liège - ULiège > Centre de recherches du cyclotron
More authors (15 more) Less
Language :
English
Title :
Brain function in the vegetative state
Publication date :
December 2002
Journal title :
Acta Neurologica Belgica
ISSN :
0300-9009
eISSN :
2240-2993
Publisher :
Acta Medica Belgica, Brussels, Belgium
Volume :
102
Issue :
4
Pages :
177-185
Peer reviewed :
Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi
Available on ORBi :
since 12 November 2008

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