Alterations in motor functional connectivity in Neonatal Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy

ABSTRACT

Background

Neonatal hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) is the result of global hypoxic-ischemic brain injury in neonates due to asphyxia during birth and is one of the most common causes of severe, long-term neurologic deficits in children. Methods: Resting state fMRI (rs-fMRI) was used to assess potential functional disruptions in the primary and association motor areas in HIE neonates (n = 16) compared to healthy controls (n = 11).

Results

Results demonstrate reduced intra-hemispheric resting state functional connectivity (rs-FC) between primary motor regions (upper extremity and facial motor regions) as well as reduced inter-hemispheric rs-FC in the HIE group. In addition, HIE neonates demonstrated increased rs-FC between motor regions and frontal, temporal and parietal cortices but decreased rs-FC with the cerebellum.

Discussion

These preliminary results provide initial evidence for the disruption of functional communication with the motor network in neonates with HIE. Further studies are necessary to both validate these findings in a larger dataset as well as to determine if rs-fMRI measurements collected at birth may have the potential to serve as a prognostic marker in addition to the traditional combination of clinical measurements and conventional MRI.

KEYWORDS:

• Hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy
• neonatal
• motor functional connectivity
• resting-state fMRI

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the 2016 RSNA Research Seed Grant #RSD1629. The authors wish to acknowledge Ahad Azeem who helped with data collection and the Core for Translational Research Imaging at Maryland (CTRIM) which is part of the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Center for Innovative Biomedical Resources, Baltimore, Maryland.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) [Research Seed Grant #RSD1629].