Patricia
Figueiredo1, Alberto Leal2
1Instituto
Superior Tcnico, Lisbon, Portugal; 2Department of
Neurophysiology, Hospital Jlio de Matos, Lisbon, Portugal
One
of the challenges of EEG-fMRI techniques in epilepsy is the investigation of
the spatio-temporal dynamics of seizure-related BOLD signals. Here, we have
employed Dynamic Causal Modelling (DCM) to test a number of competing models
of discharge propagation within a network of functionally connected brain
areas identified from EEG-fMRI data of ictal activity, in a patient with
epilepsy associated with a hypothalamic hamartoma. Our results demonstrated
the feasibility and utility of DCM in the study of the origin and propagation
pathway of seizure activity, which may be of critical importance when
deciding the surgical approach for epilepsy treatment.