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Presurgical functional transcranial Doppler sonography (fTCD) with intravenous echo enhancing agent SonoVue enables determination of language lateralization in epilepsy patients with poor temporal bone windows
Author(s) -
House Patrick M.,
Brückner Katja E.,
Lohmann Hubertus H.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
epilepsia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.687
H-Index - 191
eISSN - 1528-1167
pISSN - 0013-9580
DOI - 10.1111/j.1528-1167.2010.02951.x
Subject(s) - lateralization of brain function , transcranial doppler , medicine , epilepsy , temporal bone , radiology , audiology , surgery , psychiatry
Summary Presurgical determination of language lateralization is important for planning and outcome estimation of neurosurgical interventions in patients with drug‐refractory epilepsy. Functional transcranial Doppler sonography (fTCD) provides an established measure for language lateralization using the temporal bone windows for continuous recording of the cerebral blood flow velocity (CBFV) in both middle cerebral arteries (MCAs). However, because of insufficient temporal bone windows, fTCD cannot be applied properly in every patient. Here, we established stable and sufficient CBFV signals in both MCAs using continuous intravenous application of echo‐enhancing agent SonoVue in 7 of 10 patients with poor temporal bone windows and were thus able to determine language lateralization. We conclude that the application of SonoVue can solve one principal disadvantage of fTCD and improves the applicability of the technique as a presurgical functional language lateralization procedure.