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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Hum. Neurosci.
Sec. Brain Health and Clinical Neuroscience
Volume 19 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2025.1559914
Assessing Prefrontal Cortex Activity in Graves' Disease: A Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Study
Provisionally accepted
Simon Skau1,2*
Mats Holmberg3,4
Birgitta Johansson1
Lina Bunketort Käll1,5
Helge Malmgren6
Hans Georg Kuhn1Helena Filipsson Nyström4,6- 1Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology, Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
- 2Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, Faculty of Health, Science and Technology, Karlstad University, Karlstad, Värmland, Sweden
- 3Department of Medicine, Huddinge, Karolinska Institutet (KI), Huddinge, Stockholm, Sweden
- 4The Wallenberg Centre for Molecular and Translational Medicine, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
- 5Centre for Advanced Reconstruction of Extremities, Sahlgrenska University Hospital, Mölndal, Skåne, Sweden
- 6Institute of Medicine, Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
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Introduction: Graves' disease (GD) is associated with cognitive, emotional, and fatigue difficulties. Objective measures of cognitive dysfunction have yielded mixed results. The aim of this study was to investigated whether premenopausal female patients with first-time hyperthyroid GD (mean age 34 years) exhibit cognitive fatigability and altered functional activity in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) during an exhausting cognitive task.Methods: Using the Animal Stroop test, we compared patients with GD (N=28) and healthy controls (N=28) before and after a 30-minute cognitively exhausting reading comprehension task.Results: Both groups showed improvements in Stroop task performance after the reading task (p<0.001, ηp²=0.389), and no group differences were observed in cognitive performance. Increased activation in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex post-test was found for controls but not for patients with GD. Exploratory analyses showed higher increases in oxy-hemoglobin levels post-test in the PFC of controls compared to patients with GD, indicating reduced PFC involvement in patients with GD.Discussion: In conclusion, we were not able to show any change in the functional activity of the PFC after prolonged mental activity in this set-up using fNIRS of hyperthyroid GD patients. Further studies are needed to understand the mechanism behind self-reported fatigue in GD.
Keywords: Graves' disease, Mental Fatigue, fatigability, fNIRS, near-infrared spectroscopy, Stroop, frontal cortex, thyroid
Received: 13 Jan 2025; Accepted: 08 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Skau, Holmberg, Johansson, Bunketort Käll, Malmgren, Kuhn and Filipsson Nyström. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Simon Skau, Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology, Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
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