Ekkehard Kstermann1, Markus Ebke2, Katja Dolge3, Dieter Leibfritz4, Manfred Herrmann5
1ZKW & CAI, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany; 2Neurology, Stroke Unit, Klinikum Bremen-Mitte, Bremen, Germany; 3Jacobs Center on Lifelong Learning and Institutional Development, Jacobs University, Bremen, Germany; 4Organic Chemistry, Instr. Analytics, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany; 5Department of Neuropsychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany
An imaginary walking task was used to investigate neuronal correlates of gait disturbance in normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH) patients. For this purpose, fMRI measurements performed before lumbar puncture (LP) were compared with those afterwards, when the gait performance improved. While the main activation maps under both conditions were fairly similar, more subtle changes were detected in several regions: In fronto-polar, temporal, and parietal regions as well as the precuneus the mean BOLD signal time courses were found to be larger before LP than afterwards, whereas in the region around the Rolandic Operculum the opposite was observed.