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. 2023 Feb 21:2023:5598047.
doi: 10.1155/2023/5598047. eCollection 2023.

Functional Connectivity Changes in the Insular Subregions of Patients with Obstructive Sleep Apnea after 6 Months of Continuous Positive Airway Pressure Treatment

Ting Long  1 , Haijun Li  1   2 , Yongqiang Shu  1 , Kunyao Li  1 , Wei Xie  1 , Yaping Zeng  1 , Ling Huang  1 , Li Zeng  1 , Xiang Liu  1 , Dechang Peng  1   2
Affiliations

Functional Connectivity Changes in the Insular Subregions of Patients with Obstructive Sleep Apnea after 6 Months of Continuous Positive Airway Pressure Treatment

Ting Long et al. Neural Plast. .

Abstract

This study was aimed at investigating the functional connectivity (FC) changes between the insular subregions and whole brain in patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) after 6 months of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) treatment and at exploring the relationship between resting-state FC changes and cognitive impairment in OSA patients. Data from 15 patients with OSA before and after 6 months of CPAP treatment were included in this study. The FC between the insular subregions and whole brain was compared between baseline and after 6 months of CPAP treatment in OSA. After 6 months of treatment, OSA patients had increased FC from the right ventral anterior insula to the bilateral superior frontal gyrus and bilateral middle frontal gyrus and increased FC from the left posterior insula to the left middle temporal gyrus and left inferior temporal gyrus. Hyperconnectivity was found from the right posterior insula to the right middle temporal gyrus, bilateral precuneus, and bilateral posterior cingulate cortex, which mainly involved the default mode network. There are changes in functional connectivity patterns between the insular subregions and whole brain in OSA patients after 6 months of CPAP treatment. These changes provide a better understanding of the neuroimaging mechanisms underlying the improvement in cognitive function and emotional impairment in OSA patients and can be used as potential biomarkers for clinical CPAP treatment.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the study was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Schematic diagram of OSA patient process in this study.
Figure 2
Figure 2
The distribution patterns of resting-state functional connectivity in different insular subregions are highly similar in pre-CPAP OSA and post-CPAP OSA.
Figure 3
Figure 3
(a) Denotes the FC difference of post-CPAP OSA relative to pre-CPAP OSA based on the right vAI seed. (b) Denotes the FC difference of post-CPAP OSA relative to pre-CPAP OSA based on the left PI seed. (c) Denotes the FC difference of post-CPAP OSA relative to pre-CPAP OSA based on the right PI seed (voxel level p < 0.01, cluster-wise p < 0.05, two-tailed, GRF corrected). (d) Mean FC z signal values of pre- and post-CPAP OSA patients in altered regional brain areas before and after CPAP treatment. Color bars indicate t-scores; warm colors indicate areas where the FC value in pre-CPAP OSA is greater than that in post-CPAP. OSA: patients with obstructive sleep apnea; vAI: ventral anterior insula; PI: posterior insula; FC: functional connectivity; SFG: superior frontal gyrus; MFG: middle frontal gyrus; MTG: middle temporal gyrus; ITG: inferior temporal gyrus; Pre: precuneus; PCC: posterior cingulate cortex; L: left; R: right.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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