Borderzone Strokes and Transcortical Aphasia

Borderzone infarcts (BZIs) are anatomically defined as ischemic lesions occurring at the junction between two arterial territories, accounting for 2% to 10% of strokes. Three types of hemispheric BZIs are described according to topography (ie, superficial anterior, posterior, and deep). Although published series on related aphasia are rare in the setting of BZI, aphasia is of transcortical (TCA) type, characterized by the preservation of repetition. TCA can be of motor, sensory, or mixed type depending on whether expression, understanding, or both are impaired. Recent studies have reported specific aphasic patterns. BZI patients initially presented with mixed TCA. Aphasia specifically evolved according to the stroke location, toward motor or sensory TCA in patients with respectively anterior or posterior BZI. TCA was associated with good long-term prognosis. This specific aphasic pattern is interesting in clinical practice because it prompts the suspicion of a BZI before the MRI is done, and it helps in the planning of rehabilitation and in providing adapted information to the patient and family concerning the likelihood of language recovery.     

Recovery of semantic word processing in global aphasia: a functional MRI study

One important issue concerning the recovery of higher cognitive functions-such as word comprehension in aphasia-is to what extent impairments can be compensated for by intact parts of the network of areas normally involved in a closely related function ("redundancy recovery"). In a previous functional MRI investigation, we were able to show that left hemispheric redundancy recovery within a distributed system of related lexical-semantic functions was the most probable basis of recovery of comprehension from transcortical sensory aphasia. The question remained, however, whether redundancy recovery may play a more general role in the recovery of comprehension after large left hemispheric lesions and severe aphasia. We had the possibility, using the same fMRI paradigm, to study seven cases with left middle cerebral artery (MCA) infarction and partial recovery of comprehension > or =6 months after presentation with global aphasia on acute assessment. Lateralization of activation did not differ significantly between patients and controls. The most consistent regions of activation included the left extrasylvian posterior temporal and the right posterior parietal cortex. Recovery of language comprehension was associated predominantly with activations in regions, which were also activated in several normal subjects. We suggest that a redundancy recovery mechanism within multiple representations of closely related functions was more important than take-over of function by previously unrelated areas (vicariation) as the basis of recovery of word comprehension in our patients in spite of extensive left hemispheric damage. We conclude that redundancy within the lexical-semantic system seems to make an important contribution to recovery of comprehension even in severe aphasia.     

Delusions and mood disorders in patients with chronic aphasia

Sixty-one inpatients manifesting chronic aphasic syndromes were reviewed. Most aphasic patients with behavioral abnormalities sufficiently severe to require hospitalization had posterior hemispheric lesions and fluent disorders. Thirty-eight (62%) had fluent aphasia, eight (13%) had nonfluent aphasia, and 15 (25%) had anomic, global, or transcortical aphasic syndromes. Delusions were more common among patients with fluent aphasias (58%), whereas depression was the most common psychiatric disorder among patients with anterior lesions (63%). Elation occurred in 12 patients, 11 with posterior lesions and 1 with a nonlocalizing syndrome. Neuropsychiatric disturbances in patients with chronic aphasia syndromes correlate with the type of language disorder and with the location of the associated lesion.     

Crossed aphasia: a PET follow up study of two cases.

Two cases of aphasia after right hemispheric stroke in right handed patients are described. The first patient had a severe mixed transcortical aphasia, apraxia and neglect after a lesion involving the right lenticular nucleus and periventricular white matter; aphasia was still present after three months. The second patient had a mild, transient fluent aphasia after a small right hemispheric periventricular lesion. Studies with [18F]FDG and positron emission tomography (PET) showed functional depression extending to the structurally unaffected left hemisphere in both patients in the acute stage. After three months, in the patient with persistent aphasia, metabolism was still reduced in the right hemisphere, with some recovery of hypometabolism on the left, while metabolic values had returned to normal in the patient with full language recovery. A close parallelism between glucose metabolism and clinical course in crossed aphasia is shown, as well as the presence of a functional involvement of the structurally unaffected left hemisphere in the acute stage.     

The canonical semantic network supports residual language function in chronic post‐stroke aphasia

Current theories of language recovery after stroke are limited by a reliance on small studies. Here, we aimed to test predictions of current theory and resolve inconsistencies regarding right hemispheric contributions to long‐term recovery. We first defined the canonical semantic network in 43 healthy controls. Then, in a group of 43 patients with chronic post‐stroke aphasia, we tested whether activity in this network predicted performance on measures of semantic comprehension, naming, and fluency while controlling for lesion volume effects. Canonical network activation accounted for 22%–33% of the variance in language test scores. Whole‐brain analyses corroborated these findings, and revealed a core set of regions showing positive relationships to all language measures. We next evaluated the relationship between activation magnitudes in left and right hemispheric portions of the network, and characterized how right hemispheric activation related to the extent of left hemispheric damage. Activation magnitudes in each hemispheric network were strongly correlated, but four right frontal regions showed heightened activity in patients with large lesions. Activity in two of these regions (inferior frontal gyrus pars opercularis and supplementary motor area) was associated with better language abilities in patients with larger lesions, but poorer language abilities in patients with smaller lesions. Our results indicate that bilateral language networks support language processing after stroke, and that right hemispheric activations related to extensive left hemispheric damage occur outside of the canonical semantic network and differentially relate to behavior depending on the extent of left hemispheric damage. Hum Brain Mapp 38:1636–1658, 2017. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Right‐hemispheric processing of non‐linguistic word features: Implications for mapping language recovery after stroke

Verbal stimuli often induce right‐hemispheric activation in patients with aphasia after left‐hemispheric stroke. This right‐hemispheric activation is commonly attributed to functional reorganization within the language system. Yet previous evidence suggests that functional activation in right‐hemispheric homologues of classic left‐hemispheric language areas may partly be due to processing nonlinguistic perceptual features of verbal stimuli. We used functional MRI (fMRI) to clarify the role of the right hemisphere in the perception of nonlinguistic word features in healthy individuals. Participants made perceptual, semantic, or phonological decisions on the same set of auditorily and visually presented word stimuli. Perceptual decisions required judgements about stimulus‐inherent changes in font size (visual modality) or fundamental frequency contour (auditory modality). The semantic judgement required subjects to decide whether a stimulus is natural or man‐made; the phonologic decision required a decision on whether a stimulus contains two or three syllables. Compared to phonologic or semantic decision, nonlinguistic perceptual decisions resulted in a stronger right‐hemispheric activation. Specifically, the right inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), an area previously suggested to support language recovery after left‐hemispheric stroke, displayed modality‐independent activation during perceptual processing of word stimuli. Our findings indicate that activation of the right hemisphere during language tasks may, in some instances, be driven by a “nonlinguistic perceptual processing” mode that focuses on nonlinguistic word features. This raises the possibility that stronger activation of right inferior frontal areas during language tasks in aphasic patients with left‐hemispheric stroke may at least partially reflect increased attentional focus on nonlinguistic perceptual aspects of language. Hum Brain Mapp, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Neuroanatomic correlation of the post-stroke aphasias studied with imaging

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Stroke is the leading cause of disability in many countries. Aphasia is a common sign of stroke that is observed in about one-third of stroke patients and contributes to disease morbidity. However, the relationship between anatomy and different forms of aphasia remains poorly understood. We intend to study the characteristics of aphasia in the acute stage of stroke and to identify neuroanatomical correlates using MRI. METHODS: Lesion sites were selected from 1198 patients with cerebral infarction, who were hospitalized in the stroke unit of our hospital between March 2002 and March 2006. We enrolled 325 patients who fulfilled our criteria. All patients received an MRI examination within 1 week after admission and were evaluated with the Western battery aphasia (WAB) test, in order to determine what type of aphasia they had. The severity of their language deficit was further classified using the Boston diagnostic aphasia examination (BDAE) severity grading standard. RESULTS: Among 1198 cases, five cases with Broca's areas and four cases with Wernicke's areas lesions on MRI works were free of language deficits. Within the 325 patients who demonstrated clinical signs of aphasia, the results of WAB showed that there were 83 Broca' aphasia cases, 48 Wernicke's aphasia cases, 12 conduction aphasia cases, 36 transcortical motor aphasia cases, 17 transcortical sensory aphasia cases, 19 transcortical mixed aphasia cases, 58 global aphasia cases and 52 anomic aphasia cases. Two hundred and eighty-eight cases were located within classical language centers while 37 cases were located at other sites. In 325 aphasia patients with grade criteria of BDAE of grades 0, 1, 2, 3 or 4, there were 84, 79, 77, 63 and 22 cases respectively. Many of cases with grades 0 and 1 were distributed within classical language centers. CONCLUSION: This study showed that it is possible to draw a neuroanatomical map of aphasia that encompasses the 95% of aphasia cases. It also demonstrates that the main determinant of aphasic disorders is the neuroanatomical location of the lesion. Furthermore, this study shows that most lesion locations associated with specific aphasic disorders fit classical data associated with previous aphasia research. More importantly, the language disorders of patients whose lesions were located at classical language centers were more serious. Consequently, this paper demonstrates the power of MRI in prognosticating the potential for a patient to recover from aphasia due to stroke.     

Recovery of Semantic Word Processing in Transcortical Sensory Aphasia: a Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study

In a previous functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study with normal subjects, we demonstrated regions related to conceptual-semantic word processing around the first frontal sulcus (BA 9) and the posterior parietal lobe (BA 7/40) in agreement with several previous reports. We had the possibility, using the same fMRI paradigm, to study two consecutive cases with left middle cerebral artery (MCA) infarction (RC and HP) and lesions affecting either solely the pre-frontal (HP) or both the pre-frontal and posterior parietal part of the network activated in normal subjects (RC). Both patients showed transcortical sensory aphasia (TSA) on acute assessment. This contradicts classical disconnection accounts of the syndrome stating intact conceptual representations in TSA. Their recovery of language comprehension was associated with activation of a left hemispheric network. Mainly activations of left perilesional pre-frontal regions (RC), left Wernicke’s area (RC and HP) or the left posterior middle and inferior temporal cortex (HP) were demonstrated in the TSA patients. The latter findings suggest that in our cases of TSA functional take-over has occurred in regions with related functions (‘redundancy recovery’) rather than in previously unrelated areas (‘vicarious functioning’). Our data support distributed models of conceptual-semantic word processing and multiple left hemispheric representations of closely related functions.     

Recovery of semantic word processing in transcortical sensory aphasia: a functional magnetic resonance imaging study

In a previous functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study with normal subjects, we demonstrated regions related to conceptual-semantic word processing around the first frontal sulcus (BA 9) and the posterior parietal lobe (BA 7/40) in agreement with several previous reports. We had the possibility, using the same fMRI paradigm, to study two consecutive cases with left middle cerebral artery (MCA) infarction (RC and HP) and lesions affecting either solely the pre-frontal (HP) or both the pre-frontal and posterior parietal part of the network activated in normal subjects (RC). Both patients showed transcortical sensory aphasia (TSA) on acute assessment. This contradicts classical disconnection accounts of the syndrome stating intact conceptual representations in TSA. Their recovery of language comprehension was associated with activation of a left hemispheric network. Mainly activations of left perilesional pre-frontal regions (RC), left Wernicke's area (RC and HP) or the left posterior middle and inferior temporal cortex (HP) were demonstrated in the TSA patients. The latter findings suggest that in our cases of TSA functional take-over has occurred in regions with related functions ('redundancy recovery') rather than in previously unrelated areas ('vicarious functioning'). Our data support distributed models of conceptual-semantic word processing and multiple left hemispheric representations of closely related functions.     

Aphasia after stroke: type, severity and prognosis. The Copenhagen aphasia study

AIM: To determine the types, severity and evolution of aphasia in unselected, acute stroke patients and evaluate potential predictors for language outcome 1 year after stroke. METHODS: 270 acute stroke patients with aphasia (203 with first-ever strokes) were included consecutively and prospectively from three hospitals in Copenhagen, Denmark, and assessed with the Western Aphasia Battery. The assessment was repeated 1 year after stroke. RESULTS: The frequencies of the different types of aphasia in acute first-ever stroke were: global 32%, Broca's 12%, isolation 2%, transcortical motor 2%, Wernicke's 16%, transcortical sensory 7%, conduction 5% and anomic 25%. These figures are not substantially different from what has been found in previous studies of more or less selected populations. The type of aphasia always changed to a less severe form during the first year. Nonfluent aphasia could evolve into fluent aphasia (e.g., global to Wernicke's and Broca's to anomic), whereas a fluent aphasia never evolved into a nonfluent aphasia. One year after stroke, the following frequencies were found: global 7%, Broca's 13%, isolation 0%, transcortical motor 1%, Wernicke's 5%, transcortical sensory 0%, conduction 6% and anomic 29%. The distribution of aphasia types in acute and chronic aphasia is, thus, quite different. The outcome for language function was predicted by initial severity of the aphasia and by the initial stroke severity (assessed by the Scandinavian Stroke Scale), but not by age, sex or type of aphasia. Thus, a scoring of general stroke severity helps to improve the accuracy of the prognosis for the language function. One year after stroke, fluent aphasics were older than nonfluent aphasics, whereas such a difference was not found in the acute phase.     

Acute aphasia after right hemisphere stroke

Right hemispheric stroke aphasia (RHSA) rarely occurs in right- or left-handed patients with their language representation in right hemisphere (RH). For right-handers, the term crossed aphasia is used. Single cases, multiple cases reports, and reviews suggest more variable anatomo-clinical correlations. We included retrospectively from our stroke data bank 16 patients (right- and left-handed, and ambidextrous) with aphasia after a single first-ever ischemic RH stroke. A control group was composed of 25 successive patients with left hemispheric stroke and aphasia (LHSA). For each patient, we analyzed four modalities of language (spontaneous fluency, naming, repetition, and comprehension) and recorded eventual impairment: (1) on admission (hyperacute) and (2) between day 3 and 14 (acute). Lesion volume and location as measured on computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) were transformed into Talairach stereotaxic space. Nonparametric statistics were used to compare impaired/nonimpaired patients. Comprehension and repetition were less frequently impaired after RHSA (respectively, 56% and 50%) than after LHSA (respectively, 84% and 80%, P = 0.05 and 0.04) only at hyperacute phase. Among RHSA, fewer left-handers/ambidextrous than right-handers had comprehension disorders at second evaluation (P = 0.013). Mean infarct size was similar in RHSA and LHSA with less posterior RHSA lesions (caudal to the posterior commissure). Comprehension and repetition impairments were more often associated with anterior lesions in RHSA (Fisher’s exact test, P < 0.05). Despite the small size of the cohort, our findings suggest increased atypical anatomo-functional correlations of RH language representation, particularly in non-right-handed patients.     

Global aphasia without hemiparesis: language profiles and lesion distribution

OBJECTIVES: Global aphasia without hemiparesis (GAWH) is an uncommon stroke syndrome involving receptive and expressive language impairment, without the hemiparesis typically manifested by patients with global aphasia after large left perisylvian lesions. A few cases of GAWH have been reported with conflicting conclusions regarding pathogenesis, lesion localisation, and recovery. The current study was conducted to attempt to clarify these issues. METHODS: Ten cases of GAWH were prospectively studied with language profiles and lesion analysis; five patients had multiple lesions, four patients had a single lesion, and one had a subarachnoid haemorrhage. Eight patients met criteria for cardioembolic ischaemic stroke. RESULTS: Cluster analysis based on acute language profiles disclosed three subtypes of patients with GAWH; these clusters persisted on follow up language assessment. Each cluster evolved into a different aphasia subtype: persistent GAWH, Wernicke's aphasia, or transcortical motor aphasia (TCM). Composite lesion analysis showed that persistent GAWH was related to lesioning of the left superior temporal gyrus. Patients with acute GAWH who evolved into TCM type aphasia had common lesioning of the left inferior frontal gyrus and adjacent subcortical white matter. Patients with acute GAWH who evolved into Wernicke's type aphasia were characterised by lesioning of the left precentral and postcentral gyri. Recovery of language was poor in all but one patient. CONCLUSIONS: Although patients with acute GAWH are similar on neurological examination, they are heterogeneous with respect to early aphasia profile, language recovery, and lesion profile.     

Enhanced estimations of post‐stroke aphasia severity using stacked multimodal predictions

The severity of post‐stroke aphasia and the potential for recovery are highly variable and difficult to predict. Evidence suggests that optimal estimation of aphasia severity requires the integration of multiple neuroimaging modalities and the adoption of new methods that can detect multivariate brain‐behavior relationships. We created and tested a multimodal framework that relies on three information sources (lesion maps, structural connectivity, and functional connectivity) to create an array of unimodal predictions which are then fed into a final model that creates “stacked multimodal predictions” (STAMP). Crossvalidated predictions of four aphasia scores (picture naming, sentence repetition, sentence comprehension, and overall aphasia severity) were obtained from 53 left hemispheric chronic stroke patients (age: 57.1 ± 12.3 yrs, post‐stroke interval: 20 months, 25 female). Results showed accurate predictions for all four aphasia scores (correlation true vs. predicted: r = 0.79–0.88). The accuracy was slightly smaller but yet significant (r = 0.66) in a full split crossvalidation with each patient considered as new. Critically, multimodal predictions produced more accurate results that any single modality alone. Topological maps of the brain regions involved in the prediction were recovered and compared with traditional voxel‐based lesion‐to‐symptom maps, revealing high spatial congruency. These results suggest that neuroimaging modalities carry complementary information potentially useful for the prediction of aphasia scores. More broadly, this study shows that the translation of neuroimaging findings into clinically useful tools calls for a shift in perspective from unimodal to multimodal neuroimaging, from univariate to multivariate methods, from linear to nonlinear models, and, conceptually, from inferential to predictive brain mapping. Hum Brain Mapp 38:5603–5615, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Plasticity of language-related brain function during recovery from stroke

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: This study was undertaken to correlate functional recovery from aphasia after acute stroke with the temporal evolution of the anatomic, physiological, and functional changes as measured by MRI. METHODS: Blood oxygenation level-dependent contrast and echo-planar MRI were used to map language comprehension in 6 normal adults and in 2 adult patients during recovery from acute stroke presenting with aphasia. Perfusion, diffusion, sodium, and conventional anatomic MRI were used to follow physiological and structural changes. RESULTS: The normal activation pattern for language comprehension showed activation predominately in left-sided Wernicke's and Broca's areas, with laterality ratios of 0.8 and 0.3, respectively. Recovery of the patient confirmed as having a completed stroke affecting Broca's area occurred rapidly with a shift of activation to the homologous region in the right hemisphere within 3 days, with continued rightward lateralization over 6 months. In the second patient, in whom mapping was performed fortuitously before stroke, recovery of a Wernicke's aphasia showed a similar increasing rightward shift in activation recruitment over 9 months after the event. CONCLUSIONS: Recovery of aphasia in adults can occur rapidly and is concomitant with an activation pattern that changes from left to a homologous right hemispheric pattern. Such recovery occurs even when the stroke evolves to completion. Such plasticity must be considered when evaluating stroke interventions based on behavioral and neurological measurements.     

Distributed anatomy of transcortical sensory aphasia

We examined four patients with transcortical sensory aphasia and eight with milder language disturbances but with similar thalamic and/or temporo-occipital lesions. Specific attention was paid to differentiation of the computed tomographic lesion site of the milder cases from the transcortical sensory aphasia cases. The critical lesion for transcortical sensory aphasia in these patients involved pathways in the posterior periventricular white matter adjacent to the posterior temporal isthmus, pathways that are probably converging on the inferolateral temporo-occipital cortex. Analysis of the language function of these patients, of the influence of sensory modalities on language function, and of the interaction between semantic memory and semantic lexical functions suggests the existence of a specific brain system for semantic functions. This semantic system has a particular distributed anatomy. We propose that damage to this system may have a variety of clinical manifestations in language and in memory, depending on the exact lesion configuration.     

卒中后失语症类型及其影响因素分析

目的 通过探讨性别、年龄、病变部位及卒中病因等与失语症类型之间的关系,探索影响卒中后失 语类型的因素。 方法 回顾性分析2004年1月-2018年12月于首都医科大学附属北京天坛医院就诊、因语言障碍进行 西部失语成套测验（western aphasia battery,WAB）的卒中后失语症患者临床资料。分析失语症类型与 性别、年龄、卒中类型、卒中病因及发病机制之间的关系。 结果 共纳入失语症患者681例,按照失语症类型分为完全性失语（global aphasia,GA）（n =185）、 运动性失语（broca’s aphasia,BA）（n =148）、经皮质混合性失语（mixed transcortical aphasia,MTCA） （n =30）、经皮质运动性失语（transcortical motor aphasia,TCMA）（n =67）、感觉性失语（werni cke’s aphasia,WA）（n =69）、经皮质感觉性失语（transcortical sensor aphasia,TCSA）（n =21）、传导性失 语（conduction aphasia,CA）（n =32）和命名性失语（anomic aphasia,NA）（n =129）。将患者分为青年组 （18～44岁）、中年组（45～59岁）、老年组（≥60岁）,校正其他因素影响后,三组人群间失语症类型 无统计学差异。男性和女性患者的失语症类型也无统计学差异。各类型失语症患者的病变部位具有 异质性,除合并经典语言区损伤外,还可合并左侧基底节及丘脑损伤。在脑出血所致的各类型失语 症患者中,最常见的病因均为高血压（77.8%～100.0%）。脑梗死后GA患者中,最常见的卒中发病机制 是混合型（42.4%）和动脉-动脉栓塞（27.3%）,而BA、WA及CA患者以动脉-动脉栓塞（分别占51.5%, 71.4%和40.0%）最常见,TCMA、TCSA及NA以低灌注/栓子清除能力下降（分别占65.9%,58.3%和 38.4%）最常见。 结论 年龄及性别对失语症类型均无明显影响。男性和女性患者均以GA、BA和NA最为常见。病变 部位对失语症类型具有重要影响,卒中病因及发病机制对失语症类型的影响可能与特定血管及血管 供血区损伤有关。     

Young adult stroke: neuropsychological dysfunction and recovery

Etiology, neuropsychological deficits, aphasia type, and recovery were retrospectively studied in 254 young adults with stroke. Cardiac embolism was the most common cause of stroke in patients younger than 40, while atherosclerosis was the most frequent etiology among those aged 41-50 years. In 166 aphasic patients, Broca's aphasia was the most common while Wernicke's and transcortical aphasias were rare. Compared with an older aphasic population, young patients had significantly more nonfluent aphasias and fewer comprehension deficits. These differences were related to stroke localization: the majority of infarcts localized by computed tomography in 37 patients involved either the entire middle cerebral artery territory or its superior or deep branches, explaining the preponderance of nonfluent aphasia. Prognosis of aphasia in our patients was better than has been reported for non-age-selected aphasia populations. Roughly one third of our patients recovered completely, one third improved, and one third had an unresolved language deficit. Complete recovery and significant improvement were observed even greater than 6 months after stroke. In some patients, recovery was much better than might have been predicted from lesion site and size depicted on computed tomograms.     

Repeating through the insula: evidence from two consecutive strokes

Mixed transcortical aphasia is a very rare syndrome characterized by intact repetition, despite severe impairment in all other language modalities. In some cases, however, preservation of repetition is accompanied by intact reading. We report the case of a left-handed man who, after a subcortical stroke in the left hemisphere, showed the typical features of mixed transcortical aphasia with spared repetition and reading. After 10 days, a second stroke, involving the anterior insula and adjacent white matter bundles, markedly deteriorated repetition while his reading abilities recovered. By comparing features of repetition and reading before and after the second stroke, we provide evidence for the existence of a modular organization of language abilities, pointing to the primary role of the insula and surrounding white matter in phonological processing.     

Response to Speech and Language Therapy According to Artery Involvement and Lesion Location in Post-stroke Aphasia

PurposeAphasia is one of the most common complications after stroke and occurs in 21–38% of the patients during acute period. The present study aimed to investigate the response to speech and language therapy according to artery involvement and lesion location in patients with post-stroke aphasia.MethodThe medical records of 107 patients with post-stroke aphasia (mean age, 58.8 ± 14.8 years) who were admitted to a single rehabilitation center for usual care after stroke were reviewed. Location of the ischemic lesion and involved artery was determined assessing the brain MRI of the patients. All the patients received 24 sessions speech and language therapy (3 days a week) as a part of 8-week rehabilitation program. Evaluation of the aphasia was performed with Gülhane Aphasia Test-2 (GAT-2) at baseline and at the end of the rehabilitation program.ResultsBaseline GAT-2 scores was significantly worse in patients with middle cerebral artery (MCA) involvement compared to patients with other artery involvements (p = 0.007). While the GAT-2 scores of patients with MCA involvement were improved significantly after speech and language therapy (p < 0.001), the changes in those with anterior cerebral artery (ACA) and posterior cerebral artery (PCA) involvements were not significant (p > 0.05).ConclusionsThe present findings suggested that speech functions might be more affected in ischemic lesion of MCA and response to SLT might be better in patients with MCA involvement.     

高分辨率磁共振对大脑中动脉斑块与梗死灶类型关系的研究

目的 本研究主要应用高分辨率磁共振成像（high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging,HRMRI）探索 大脑中动脉（middle cerebral artery,MCA）粥样硬化所致狭窄与梗死灶分布类型的相关性,并进一步探 索不同脑梗死类型与斑块性质、重塑率及患者发生卒中的可能机制。 方法 回顾性分析2012-2016年于南京鼓楼医院就诊的14 d内发生MCA供血区缺血性卒中并进行 HRMRI扫描的患者临床资料。在弥散加权成像（diffusion weighted imaging,DWI）上将梗死类型分为 穿支动脉梗死（perforating artery infarct,PAI）、皮质支供血区梗死（pial infarct,PI）、分水岭梗死 （border zone infarct,BZI）和混合型梗死（PAI+PI,PAI+BZI,PI+BZI,PAI+PI+BZI）。在矢状位HRMRI上测 量MCA M1段狭窄率及重构率,并收集斑块位置、长度、厚度等形态学指标。正性重构＞1.05,负性重 构＜0.95。将PAI、PI、BZI的患者分入单型梗死组,将PAI+PI、PAI+BZI、PI+BZI、PAI+PI+BZI的患者归入 混合型梗死组。 结果 共纳入51例MCA狭窄程度≤50%的患者,其中单型组32例,混合组19例。单型组中,PAI 2 2 例（68.8%）,PI 6例（18.7%）,BZI 4例（12.5%）,正性重构22例（68.8%）。混合组中PAI+BZI 7 例（36.8%）,PAI+PI 2例（10.6%）,PI+BZI 5例（26.3%）,PAI+PI+BZI 5例（26.3%）,正性重构17例 （89.5%）。混合型组的狭窄程度较单型组重（P =0.01）,斑块厚度较单型组大（P =0.001）,比较差异 有统计学意义。 结论 不同程度的MCA狭窄,其梗死灶分布有所不同,单型梗死主要为PAI,混合型梗死主要以 PAI+BZI多见。同时HRMRI发现对于轻型MCA狭窄的患者,血管的狭窄程度和斑块厚度增加可能与混合 型梗死有关。