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Clinical Article
Predictive effect of resting state whole brain voxel level functional connectivity analysis on cognitive level of patients with mild cognitive impairment associated with cerebral small vessel disease
LIANG Xiuqin  LIU Bo  WU Jiang  LI Xuan 

Cite this article as: LIANG X Q, LIU B, WU J, et al. Predictive effect of resting state whole brain voxel level functional connectivity analysis on cognitive level of patients with mild cognitive impairment associated with cerebral small vessel disease[J]. Chin J Magn Reson Imaging, 2024, 15(4): 25-31. DOI:10.12015/issn.1674-8034.2024.04.005.


[Abstract] Objective The resting state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) sequence at the voxel level was used to explore the mechanism of early cognitive impairment in patients with mild cognitive impairment associated with cerebral small vessel disease (CSVD-MCI) and analyze its correlation with clinical neuropsychology indicators.Materials and Methods Twenty-one subjects who met the diagnostic criteria of CSVD-MCI by routine MRI were screened, and 20 healthy control (HC) subjects matched with their age, gender and years of education were selected. All subjects received rs-fMRI, and calculated the value of degree centrality (DC), the peak Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI) coordinates of the two groups with significantly different DC values were used as seed points for functional connectivity (FC) analysis with other voxels in the whole brain, correlation analysis was performed between DC and FC values and Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) scores in brain regions with differences in brain function between the two groups, to further analyze the correlation between CSVD total load score and MoCA score, and CSVD total load score and each cognitive domain score.Results Compared with the HC group, the left medial superior frontal gyrus/left anterior cingulate gyrus, left angular gyrus/left supramarginal gyrus, right medial superior frontal gyrus/right middle frontal gyrus, left cerebellum and right cerebellum DC values of the CSVD-MCI group were reduced, and the FC values of the left anterior cingulate gyrus, left middle inferior temporal gyrus, bilateral precuneus, and bilateral middle cingulate gyrus were reduced. There was a significant negative correlation between white matter high signal score, CSVD total load score, and MoCA score (rs=-0.461, P=0.036; rs=-0.458, P=0.037); the total load score of CSVD was negatively correlated with visual space and executive function scores (rs=-0.473, P=0.030), but not significantly correlated with other cognitive domain scores. In the CSVD-MCI group, the FC value of left anterior cingulate cortex and right precuneus was significantly positively correlated with MoCA score (r=0.565, P=0.018).Conclusions Conventional MRI can display characteristic imaging lesions of CSVD, while rs-fMRI sequence can early detect reduced DC and FC in brain regions. The CSVD score and DC, FC are significantly correlated with clinical neuropsychological scores, and can serve as potential imaging markers for CSVD-MCI patients, revealing the potential mechanism of cognitive decline.
[Keywords] mild cognitive impairment associated with cerebral small vessel disease;resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging;magnetic resonance imaging;degree centrality;functional connectivity

LIANG Xiuqin1   LIU Bo2   WU Jiang1*   LI Xuan1  

1 Department of Magnetic Resonance, Cardiovascular Hospital of Shanxi Province, Taiyuan 030024, China

2 Department of Medical Imaging, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan 030001, China

Corresponding author: WU J, E-mail: wujiang1024@sina.com

Conflicts of interest   None.

Received  2023-07-11
Accepted  2024-03-04
DOI: 10.12015/issn.1674-8034.2024.04.005
Cite this article as: LIANG X Q, LIU B, WU J, et al. Predictive effect of resting state whole brain voxel level functional connectivity analysis on cognitive level of patients with mild cognitive impairment associated with cerebral small vessel disease[J]. Chin J Magn Reson Imaging, 2024, 15(4): 25-31. DOI:10.12015/issn.1674-8034.2024.04.005.

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