Abstract
In healthy participants, the strength of task-evoked network reconfigurations is associated with cognitive performance across several cognitive domains. It is, however, unclear whether the capacity for network reconfiguration also plays a role in cognitive deficits in brain tumor patients. In the current study, we examined whether the level of reconfiguration of the fronto-parietal (‘FPN’) and default mode network (‘DMN’) during task execution is correlated with cognitive performance in patients with different types of brain tumors. For this purpose, we combined data from a resting state and task-fMRI paradigm in patients with a glioma or meningioma. Cognitive performance was measured using the in-scanner working memory task, as well as an out-of-scanner cognitive flexibility task. Task-evoked changes in functional connectivity strength (defined as the mean of the absolute values of all connections) and in functional connectivity patterns within and between the FPN and DMN did not differ significantly across meningioma and fast (HGG) and slowly growing glioma (LGG) patients. Across these brain tumor patients, a significant and positive correlation was found between the level of task-evoked reconfiguration of the FPN and cognitive performance. This suggests that the capacity for FPN reconfiguration also plays a role in cognitive deficits in brain tumor patients, as was previously found for normal cognitive performance in healthy controls.
Highlights
In Europe, between 8.5 and 14 per 100,000 persons per year are diagnosed with a primary brain tumor (Gigineishvili et al 2014)
We examined whether the link between task-induced reconfiguration and cognitive performance generalizes to another executive function, namely cognitive flexibility that was assessed outside the scanner and did not have a direct causal relationship with the reconfigurations in brain activity measured in the scanner
One patient scored more than 2.5 standard deviations below the mean on the N-back task, 2 patients scored more than 2.5 standard deviations below the mean on the cognitive flexibility task
Summary
In Europe, between 8.5 and 14 per 100,000 persons per year are diagnosed with a primary brain tumor (Gigineishvili et al 2014). Gliomas are infiltrating tumors that lack a clear boundary between normally functioning brain tissue and pathological tumor tissue. The majority (up to 90%) of patients with a primary brain tumor show cognitive deficits (Gehring et al 2008) across multiple domains (e.g. memory, attention, information processing, executive functioning; Gehring et al 2012). These cognitive deficits can be very disruptive for a person’s daily functioning, experienced quality of life and treatment
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