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. 2022 Jun;12(6):e2609.
doi: 10.1002/brb3.2609. Epub 2022 May 19.

Standardization of presurgical language fMRI in Greek population: Mapping of six critical regions

Kostakis Gkiatis  1   2 , Kyriakos Garganis  2 , Christopher F Benjamin  3   4 , Irene Karanasiou  1 , Nikolaos Kondylidis  5 , Jean Harushukuri  2 , George K Matsopoulos  1
Affiliations

Standardization of presurgical language fMRI in Greek population: Mapping of six critical regions

Kostakis Gkiatis et al. Brain Behav. 2022 Jun.

Abstract

Background: Mapping the language system has been crucial in presurgical evaluation especially when the area to be resected is near relevant eloquent cortex. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) proved to be a noninvasive alternative of Wada test that can account not only for language lateralization but also for localization when appropriate tasks and MRI sequences are being used. The tasks utilized during the fMRI acquisition are playing a crucial role as to which areas will be activated. Recent studies demonstrated that key language regions exist outside the classical model of "Wernicke-Lichtheim-Geschwind," but sensitive tasks must take place in order to be revealed. On top of that, the tasks should be in mother tongue for appropriate language mapping to be possible.

Methods: For that reason, in this study, we adopted an English protocol that can reveal six language critical regions even in clinical setups and we translated it into Greek to prove its efficacy in Greek population. Twenty healthy right-handed volunteers were recruited and performed the fMRI acquisition in a standardized manner.

Results: Results demonstrated that all six language critical regions were activated in all subjects as well as the group mean map. Furthermore, activations were found in the thalamus, the caudate, and the contralateral cerebellum.

Conclusion: In this study, we standardized an fMRI protocol in Greek and proved that it can reliably activate six language critical regions. We have validated its efficacy for presurgical language mapping in Greek patients capable to be adopted in clinical setup.

Keywords: Greek; fMRI; language; neurology; neuropsychology; neurosurgery; presurgical.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Language fMRI protocol
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
The map of “appearances” showing the frequency with which voxels activated at the single subject level. The map is in MNI152 space and the color bar varies from 1 subject (black) to 10 subjects (white more than 10). This image shows how frequently any given voxel was identified at the single subject level. The form of analysis used can present clinical interest for surgical decision‐making. Images are in radiological orientation
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Conjunction map of the three tasks. The regions that were found activated in the left hemisphere of all the three tasks. All six language critical regions are visible as well as a region in thalamus. Pink: Broca. Blue: Exner. Yellow: Wernicke. Light blue: Supplementary motor area. Green: Angular. Brown: Basal temporal language area. Red: Thalamus
FIGURE 4
FIGURE 4
Mean statistical activation map of each task. The regions that were found activated in the group analysis of each task separately. Images are in radiological orientation. ON: Object Naming. VRN: Verbal Response Naming. ARN: Auditory Response Naming
FIGURE 5
FIGURE 5
Comparison maps between all the pairs of the tasks. Images are in radiological orientation. ON: Object Naming. VRN: Verbal Response Naming. ARN: Auditory Response Naming
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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