Default mode network and extrastriate visual resting state network in patients with Parkinson's disease dementia.

AIMS: Using fMRI, we evaluated the default mode network (DMN) and the extrastriate visual resting state network (ESV-RSN) in 14 patients with Parkinson's disease dementia (PDD) as compared with 18 patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) without dementia and 18 healthy controls (HC).

METHODS

We analyzed the seed-based functional connectivity of both resting state data and deactivations during a visual complex scene-encoding task.

RESULTS

Using the posterior cingulate cortex/precuneus as a seed for the DMN analysis, we observed significant decreases of connectivity in the right inferior frontal gyrus in PDD as compared to PD and HC. Using the caudate nucleus as a seed for the ESV-RSN analysis, we found significant decreases of connectivity in the left and right inferior occipital gyrus in PDD as compared to HC.

CONCLUSION

Differences in functional connectivity patterns between PDD and PD/HC were observed in areas known to be engaged in stimulus-driven reorienting of attention and in visual processing.