Alternations of interhemispheric functional connectivity in children with strabismus and amblyopia: a resting-state fMRI study

Abstract

Previous neuroimaging studies demonstrated that patients with strabismus or amblyopia can show significant functional and anatomical changes in the brain, but alterations of interhemispheric functional connectivity (FC) have not been well studied in this population. The current study analyzed whole-brain changes of interhemispheric FC in children with strabismus and amblyopia (CSA) using voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC).A total of 24 CSA (16 males and 8 females) and 24 normal controls (NCs) consisting of 16 and 8 age-, sex, and education-matched males and females, respectively, underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans in the resting state. According to Gaussian random field theory, changes in the resting state FC (rsFC) between hemispheres were evaluated using the VMHC method. The relationships between mean VMHC values in multiple brain regions and behavioral performance were evaluated by Pearson correlation analysis. In contrast to NCs, the CSA group showed significantly decreased VMHC values in the bilateral cerebellum, bilateral frontal superior orbital (frontal sup orb), bilateral temporal inferior(temporal inf),and bilateral frontal superior(frontal sup). CSA have abnormal interhemispheric FC in many brain regions, which may reflect dysfunction of eye movements and visual fusion. These findings might provide insight into the underlying pathogenetic mechanisms of CSA.