Altered resting-state connectivity in nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients late stage post-radiotherapy: an Independent Component Analysis

Radiotherapy is the primary treatment modality for patients with Nasopharyngeal carcinoma. However, radiotherapy in the treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma will also cause neurocognitive impairment. Previous studies mostly focused on the changes of brain structure in patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma caused by radiotherapy, but it was reported that there were changes in brain network connectivity before the brain structure was abnormal. So, the purpose of thestudy was to investigate network-level functional connectivity alternations late stage post radiation therapy in Nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients using independent component analysis of rs-fMRI.