Browsing by Author "Pearce, Sabrina Anne"
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Results Per Page
Sort Options
- ItemOpen AccessInvestigating the Relationship Between Interhemispheric Coherence, Task, and Concussion History in an Adolescent Population(2021-07-08) Pearce, Sabrina Anne; Dunn, Jeff; Yeates, Keith; Kirton, AdamPediatric mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI), including concussion, is a public health burden. There is a need for objective imaging metrics to understand the injury and to guide clinical treatment guidelines. Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) is a light-based neuroimaging technology that can be a biomarker of mTBI by measuring functional connectivity between affected brain regions. This thesis aimed to determine how task affects fNIRS measures of functional connectivity, also known as coherence, from a resting state to determine effective tasks and activated regions for mTBI studies. A secondary goal was to characterize the difference in coherence between an asymptomatic adolescent group with a previous concussion and an adolescent group that had not sustained a concussion. Results indicated that tasks decrease interhemispheric coherence relative to a resting state, especially when they require increased attention. Using these results and specific interregional combinations, we observed a decrease in coherence in a sample of adolescents with a previous concussion relative to those without, although this result should be explored in a larger sample size. Overall, this thesis adds to evidence that fNIRS may be a sensitive biomarker to mTBI, especially when combined with specific tasks.