Anterior cingulate activation and error processing during interferon-alpha treatment.
Level 3 - non-randomized controlled study
Non-randomized comparative cohort study
PubMed 16084839 · doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2005.03.033
What was done
Researchers evaluated the impact of low-dose interferon (IFN)-alpha on neural activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during a visuospatial attention task. The study compared 10 IFN-alpha-treated patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection to 11 HCV-infected control subjects.
What was found
The abstract reports no numerical values, test statistics, or p-values. IFN-alpha-treated patients reported symptoms of impaired concentration and fatigue, but demonstrated task performance and parietal/occipital brain activation similar to HCV-infected controls. IFN-alpha-treated patients exhibited significant activation in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) that was highly correlated with the number of task-related errors, a correlation not observed in control subjects.
Why it matters
These findings suggest that cytokine administration alters anterior cingulate cortex conflict monitoring, indicating that increased mental effort may be required to maintain task performance despite subjective cognitive fatigue.
Limits
The sample size was very small (total n = 21: 10 treated, 11 controls). The study was a non-randomized comparative study, no quantitative data or effect sizes were provided in the abstract, and baseline pre-treatment imaging was not described.
Cited by
- supports Studies on interferon show that inflammatory molecules preferentially alter brain activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and default mode/rumination regions.