中国神经再生研究(英文版) ›› 2022, Vol. 17 ›› Issue (8): 1850-1856.doi: 10.4103/1673-5374.332150

• 原著:退行性病与再生 • 上一篇    

针刺增强轻度认知障碍患者大脑功能的证据:功能性近红外光谱研究

  

  • 出版日期:2022-08-15 发布日期:2022-01-22
  • 基金资助:
    韩国科学和信息通信技术部主持的韩国国家研究基金会(NRF)支持

Acupuncture enhances brain function in patients with mild cognitive impairment: evidence from a functional-near infrared spectroscopy study

M. N. Afzal Khan1, Usman Ghafoor1, Ho-Ryong Yoo2, Keum-Shik Hong1, *   

  1. 1School of Mechanical Engineering, Pusan National University, Busan, Korea; 2Department of Neurology Disorders, Dunsan Hospital, Daejeon University, Daejeon, Korea
  • Online:2022-08-15 Published:2022-01-22
  • Contact: Keum-Shik Hong, PhD, kshong@pusan.ac.kr.
  • Supported by:
    This work was supported by National Research Foundation (NRF) of Korea under the auspices of the Ministry of Science and ICT, Republic of Korea (No. NRF-2020R1A2B5B03096000, to KSH).

摘要:

轻度认知障碍是阿尔茨海默病的前兆。为探讨针刺治疗是否可改增强轻度认知障碍患者大脑功能,研究招募了11名健康者和11例轻度认知障碍患者,随后对轻度认知障碍患者进行了针刺治疗。应用功能性近红外光谱技术监测参与者工作记忆任务中前额叶皮质的氧和脱氧血红蛋白信号,对信号和基于激活图的分类以及时间特征进行统计分析。结果发现,针刺治疗可以改善患者的血流动力学反应,该变化与蒙特利尔认知评估量表测试得到的认知能力一致。同时,针刺治疗还可以增强轻度认知障碍患者前额叶皮质的激活以及连接性,且与健康人相当。这些结果表明,针刺可以用于治疗轻度认知障碍。

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8528-4457 (Keum-Shik Hong)

Abstract: Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a precursor to Alzheimer’s disease. It is imperative to develop a proper treatment for this neurological disease in the aging society. This observational study investigated the effects of acupuncture therapy on MCI patients. Eleven healthy individuals and eleven MCI patients were recruited for this study. Oxy- and deoxy-hemoglobin signals in the prefrontal cortex during working-memory tasks were monitored using functional near-infrared spectroscopy. Before acupuncture treatment, working-memory experiments were conducted for healthy control (HC) and MCI groups (MCI-0), followed by 24 sessions of acupuncture for the MCI group. The acupuncture sessions were initially carried out for 6 weeks (two sessions per week), after which experiments were performed again on the MCI group (MCI-1). This was followed by another set of acupuncture sessions that also lasted for 6 weeks, after which the experiments were repeated on the MCI group (MCI-2). Statistical analyses of the signals and classifications based on activation maps as well as temporal features were performed. The highest classification accuracies obtained using binary connectivity maps were 85.7% HC vs. MCI-0, 69.5% HC vs. MCI-1, and 61.69% HC vs. MCI-2. The classification accuracies using the temporal features mean from 5 seconds to 28 seconds and maximum (i.e, max(5:28 seconds)) values were 60.6% HC vs. MCI-0, 56.9% HC vs. MCI-1, and 56.4% HC vs. MCI-2. The results reveal that there was a change in the temporal characteristics of the hemodynamic response of MCI patients due to acupuncture. This was reflected by a reduction in the classification accuracy after the therapy, indicating that the patients’ brain responses improved and became comparable to those of healthy subjects. A similar trend was reflected in the classification using the image feature. These results indicate that acupuncture can be used for the treatment of MCI patients.

Key words: acupuncture, Alzheimer’s disease, cognition, convolutional neural network, functional connectivity, functional-near infrared spectroscopy, hemodynamic response, linear discriminant analysis, mild cognitive impairment