Journal Article

Brain imaging reveals covert consciousness during behavioral unresponsiveness induced by propofol

Picton, Paul, Janke, Ellen L., Collins, Margaret M., Mashour, George A., Hudetz, Anthony G., Huang, Zirui, Vlisides, Phillip E., Harris, Richard E., Tarnal, Vijaykumar C., McKinney, Amy M., Keefe, Kelley M.

2018

Overview

Detecting covert consciousness in behaviorally unresponsive patients by brain imaging is of great interest, but a reproducible model and evidence from independent sources is still lacking. Here we demonstrate the possibility of using general anesthetics in a within-subjects study design to test methods or statistical paradigms of assessing covert consciousness. Using noninvasive neuroimaging in healthy volunteers, we identified a healthy study participant who was able to exhibit the specific fMRI signatures of volitional mental imagery while behaviorally unresponsive due to sedation with propofol. Our findings reveal a novel model that may accelerate the development of new approaches to reproducibly detect covert consciousness, which is difficult to achieve in patients with heterogeneous and sometimes clinically unstable neuropathology.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group
• Subject: 59/36 / 631/378/2649/1398 / 692/617/375/1399 / Anesthetics / Brain mapping / Consciousness / Functional magnetic resonance imaging / Humanities and Social Sciences / Medical imaging / multidisciplinary / Neuroimaging / Propofol / Science / Science (multidisciplinary)