Altered brain functional connectivity induced by physical exercise may improve neuropsychological functions in patients with benign epilepsy.

Author: Koirala GR1, Lee D2, Eom S2, Kim NY3, Kim HD4
Affiliation: <sup>1</sup>Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits Lab, Kwangwoon University, Department of Electronic Engineering, Seoul, Republic of Korea. <sup>2</sup>Epilepsy Research Institute, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea. <sup>3</sup>Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits Lab, Kwangwoon University, Department of Electronic Engineering, Seoul, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: nykim@kw.ac.kr. <sup>4</sup>Epilepsy Research Institute, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea; Division of Pediatric Neurology, Severance Children's Hospital, Yonsei University, Seoul, Republic of Korea; Department of Pediatrics, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: hdkimmd@yuhs.ac.
Conference/Journal: Epilepsy Behav.
Date published: 2017 Sep 15
Other: Pages: S1525-5050(17)30281-0 , Special Notes: doi: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2017.06.021. [Epub ahead of print] , Word Count: 273


OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to elucidate alteration in functional connectivity (FC) in patients with benign epilepsy with centrotemporal spikes (BECTS) as induced by physical exercise therapy and their correlation to the neuropsychological (NP) functions.

METHODS: We analyzed 115 artifact- and spike-free 2-second epochs extracted from resting state EEG recordings before and after 5weeks of physical exercise in eight patients with BECTS. The exact Low Resolution Electromagnetic Tomography (eLORETA) was used for source reconstruction. We evaluated the cortical current source density (CSD) power across five different frequency bands (delta, theta, alpha, beta, and gamma). Altered FC between 34 regions of interests (ROIs) was then examined using lagged phase synchronization (LPS) method. We further investigated the correlation between the altered FC measures and the changes in NP test scores.

RESULTS: We observed changes in CSD power following the exercise for all frequency bands and statistically significant increases in the right temporal region for the alpha band. There were a number of altered FC between the cortical ROIs in all frequency bands of interest. Furthermore, significant correlations were observed between FC measures and NP test scores at theta and alpha bands.

CONCLUSION: The increased localization power at alpha band may be an indication of the positive impact of exercise in patients with BECTS. Frequency band-specific alterations in FC among cortical regions were associated with the modulation of cognitive and NP functions. The significant correlation between FC and NP tests suggests that physical exercise may mitigate the severity of BECTS, thereby enhancing NP function.

Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

KEYWORDS: Benign epilepsy; Exercise; Frequency bands; Functional connectivity; Neuropsychological functions; Source localization

PMID: 28919388 DOI: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2017.06.021