ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Neurol.
Sec. Applied Neuroimaging
This article is part of the Research TopicAdvances in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Peripheral Facial Palsy: From Pathophysiology to Rehabilitation/RecoveryView all 5 articles
The alterations of neuroplasticity and functional connectivity of striatal sub-regions in Bell's palsy patients after acupuncture
Provisionally accepted
- 1Zhejiang Chinese Medical University, Hangzhou, China
- 2Zhejiang Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine, Hangzhou, China
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Bell's palsy (BP) is an acute facial palsy due to the inflammation of the facial nerve. Previous research indicates that striatum may be involved following acute peripheral nerve injury, and acupuncture is a recognized treatment for BP. However, it remains unclear whether the striatum is functionally engaged during the recovery process with acupuncture. Using resting-state functional MRI (fMRI), we investigated striatum-related neural activity in BP patients by measuring two key metrics of local brain function: regional homogeneity (ReHo, reflecting local neural synchrony) and fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (fALFF, reflecting the intensity of spontaneous neural activity). We further examined corticostriatal and internal striatal functional connectivity. Patients underwent fMRI scans before and immediately after (15 minutes following needle withdrawal) an acupuncture treatment session to capture dynamic changes. Results revealed that the post-treatment scan was associated with significant alterations in both ReHo and fALFF, including increased fALFF in the left postcentral gyrus and precentral gyrus, and increased ReHo in the right cerebellum (Crus2). Several striatal subregions also exhibited significantly enhanced internal connectivity. Our results indicate that the striatum undergoes functional alterations during the recovery period, which may provide preliminary insight into neural processes associated with treatment in BP.
Keywords: Acupuncture, Bell's palsy, fMRI, functional connectivity, Striatum
Received: 17 Aug 2025; Accepted: 12 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yu, Song, Yu, Gu, Dai, Xu and Xuan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Lihua Xuan
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