Thalamo-cortical network dysfunction in temporal lobe epilepsy.

Abstract

OBJECTIVES:

Imaging and neurophysiological data shows that the cortical disfunction caused by focal epilepsy is not limited to the epileptic focus, thus raising the modern vision of focal epilepsy as a network disorder. The involvement of deep thalamo-cortical projections in temporal lobe epilepsy is a clear example. We aimed at demonstrating the interictal functional impairment of thalamo-cortical network in drug-naïve TLE patients through the study of high frequency oscillations of somatosensory evoked potentials (HF-SEP).

METHODS:

Twelve healthy controls (HC; 8 females, 52.2 ± 17.3 years-old) and 12 drug-naïve TLE patients (8 females, 55.5 ± 21.5 years-old) underwent bilateral median HF-SEP, recorded by scalp electrodes. Cp3'-Fz and Cp4'-Fz traces were filtered (400-800 Hz) to evidence HF-SEP.

RESULTS:

HF-SEP duration in the affected hemisphere was significantly longer when compared to that of both the unaffected hemisphere and HC hemispheres. No significant inter-hemispheric differences were found in areas, powers and latencies of HF-SEP wavelets.

CONCLUSION:

Our results demonstrate that TLE induces early interictal functional impairments of the thalamo-cortical network.

SIGNIFICANCE:

Our data strongly corroborates the vision of focal epilepsy as a network disorder and offers a new neurophysiological tool to test pharmacological, surgical and neuromodulatory therapies.

• Authors: Giovanni Assenza, Jacopo Lanzone, Angelo Insola, Giulia Amatori, Lorenzo Ricci, Mario Tombini, Vincenzo Di Lazzaro
• Journal: Clinical neurophysiology : official journal of the International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology (Clin Neurophysiol) Vol. 131 Issue 2 Pg. 548-554 (02 2020) ISSN: 1872-8952 [Electronic] Netherlands
• PMID: 31818685 (Publication Type: Journal Article)
• Copyright: Copyright © 2019 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Topics

• Adult
• Aged
• Cerebral Cortex (physiopathology)
• Epilepsy, Temporal Lobe (physiopathology)
• Evoked Potentials, Somatosensory
• Female
• Humans
• Male
• Middle Aged
• Thalamus (physiopathology)