Yu-Syuan Chou1, Ming-Chou Ho2, and Jun-Cheng Weng1,3
1Department of Medical Imaging and Radiological Sciences, Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan, 2Department of Psychology, Chung Shan Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan, 3Department of Medical Imaging, Chung Shan Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan
Betel nut, also known as areca, is the fourth most
commonly used drug worldwide after tobacco, alcohol, and caffeine and also a
stimulant and addictive substance. Previously, CM Chen et al. probed into the
influence of religious affiliation on heavy betel nut chewing, and studied
on the relationship between health risk perception and betel nut chewing. Feng
Chen et al. analyzed gray matter abnormalities between betel nut chewers and
healthy subjects with voxel-based morphometry (VBM). However, there were few
studies mentioned about the functional activity and brain network changes in
betel nut chewers using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Therefore,
our aim was to use resting-state fMRI (rs-fMRI) to investigate the functional differences
between betel nut chewers and healthy participants with amplitude of low frequency
fluctuations (ALFF) and regional homogeneity (ReHo). The graph theoretical and
network-based statistic (NBS) analyses were also used to find the network difference
between two groups. Our results revealed different topological organization and poor global
integration of the brain network in the betel nut chewers.
