Changes in functional brain network topology after successful and unsuccessful corpus callosotomy for Lennox-Gastaut...

Corpus callosotomy (CC) is an effective palliative surgical treatment for patients with Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome (LGS). However, research on the long-term functional effects of CC is sparse. We aimed to investigate these effects and their associated clinical conditions over the two years after CC. Long-term clinical EEG recordings of 30 patients with LGS who had good and bad seizure outcome after CC were collected and retrospectively studied. It was found that CC caused brain network 'hubs' to shift from paramedian to lateral regions in the good-recovery group, which reorganized the brain network into a more homogeneous state. We also found increased local clustering coefficients in patients with bad outcomes and decreases, implying enhanced network integration, in patients with good outcomes. The small worldness of brain networks in patients with good outcomes increased in the two years after CC, whereas it decreased in patients with bad outcomes. The covariation of small-worldness with the rate of reduction in seizure frequency suggests that this can be used as an indicator of CC outcome. Local and global network changes during the long-term state might be associated with the postoperative recovery process and could serve as indicators for CC outcome and long-term LGS recovery.