ACTA FAC MED NAISS 2009; 26 (4): 217-223

Review article

UDC 616.831-005.1-073:616.89-008.434.5

fMRI IN LANGUAGE RECOVERY AFTER STROKE

 

Vanja Kljajević

Institute for Cognitive Science, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada


SUMMARY

In the recent years, the research on language processing have become increasingly focused on measuring brain activity by functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI). Although the technology has become an indispensable research tool when constructing and testing theories on language function in neurologically intact brain, so far it has not been fully employed to answer the question of the utmost importance to patients with brain damage: How to recover the lost function? One goal of the present paper is to examine the potential of using fMRI in language recovery after stroke, with the focus on the idea that neuroimaging assessment of preservation of language function in these patients may be as useful as behavioral data on the loss of the function when designing individual language recovery treatments

Key words: fMRI, stroke, aphasia, cerebral reorganization, neuroplasticity