AUTHOR=Guo Chuan , Sui Youxin , Xu Sheng , Zhuang Ren , Zhang Mingming , Zhu Shizhe , Wang Jin , Zhang Yushi , Kan Chaojie , Shi Ye , Wang Tong , Shen Ying 

TITLE=Contralaterally controlled neuromuscular electrical stimulation-induced changes in functional connectivity in patients with stroke assessed using functional near-infrared spectroscopy

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neural Circuits

VOLUME=Volume 16 - 2022

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neural-circuits/articles/10.3389/fncir.2022.955728

DOI=10.3389/fncir.2022.955728

ISSN=1662-5110

ABSTRACT=Contralaterally controlled neuromuscular electrical stimulation (CCNMES) is an innovative therapy in stroke rehabilitation which has been verified in clinical studies. However, the underlying mechanism of CCNMES are yet to be comprehensively revealed. The main purpose of this study was to apply functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to compare CCNMES-related changes in functional connectivity (FC) within a cortical network after stroke with those induced by neuromuscular electrical stimulation(NMES) when performing wrist dorsiflexion with hemiplegic upper extremity. Thirty-one stroke patients with right hemisphere lesion were randomly assigned to CCNMES (n = 16) or NMES (n = 15) groups. Patients in both groups received 10 min of therapy with simultaneous monitoring of data using fNIRS. The cerebral oxygenation signals in the prefrontal cortex(PFC), bilateral primary motor cortex(M1) and primary sensory cortex(S1) were measured.CCNMES/NMES-related FC changes among different regions of interest (ROI) were evaluated based on Pearson correlation coefficients.Compared with NMES, FC between right M1 and left M1/S1 were significantly strengthened during CCNMES. Additionally, significantly higher coupling strengths between right PFC and left M1/S1 were observed in the CCNMES group.Our findings suggest that CCNMES promotes the regulatory functions of ipsilesional prefrontal and motor areas as well as contralesional sensorimotor areas within the functional network in patients with stroke.