Patients with peripheral vestibular dysfunction and mental rotation in fMRI
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Description
Purpose Peripheral vestibular dysfunction (PVD) can result in impaired spatial cognition. Several studies have shown that PVD affects mental self-rotation. The mechanism through which PVD impacts mental self-rotation is still elusive.
Methods We used functional magnetic resonance imaging during a mental self-rotation task and compared brain activation between patients with PVD and healthy controls matched for age, sex, education, and handedness. We integrated several conditions of PVD: patients with acute unilateral PVD (n = 12), chronic unilateral PVD (n = 18), and bilateral PVD (n = 17).
Results All patient groups responded slower in mental rotations compared to healthy controls. Response time differences between patients and controls were strongest in acute unilateral PVD. Whole brain comparisons of mental rotation networks between patients and controls showed no significant differences. Regarding the regions of interest, we found a clear mental rotation effect in the superior parietal lobe and a deactivation pattern in the rolandic operculum in all participants. Patients with acute unilateral PVD showed a different activation pattern in the left supramarginal gyrus compared to their controls. Activation patterns in the right hippocampus showed inconclusive results.
Conclusions In this first study investigating neural correlates of mental self-rotation in patients with PVD, we found that a vestibular conflict can lead to worse performance in mental self-rotation and that left inferior parietal regions are likely to be the regions where actual body position information and mental self-rotation are integrated.
