Longitudinal trajectory of amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation changes in breast cancer patients during neoadjuvant chemotherapy–A preliminary prospective study

There is growing evidence that the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (ALFF) changes in breast cancer patients after chemotherapy. However, longitudinal changes in ALFF during chemotherapy are unclear. To assess the trajectory of ALFF changes during chemotherapy, 36 breast cancer patients underwent both resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging and neuropsychological testing at three time points, including before neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) (time point 0, TP0), after one cycle of NAC (before the second cycle of NAC, TP1), and upon completion of NAC (pre-operation, TP2). Healthy controls (HC) received the same assessments at matching time points. We compared the longitudinal changes of ALFF in the NAC and two HC groups. In the NAC group, compared with TP0, ALFF values in the right orbital part of the inferior frontal gyrus, left medial orbital part of the superior frontal gyrus, right insula, left medial part of the superior frontal gyrus, and right middle frontal gyrus declined significantly at TP1 and TP2. Compared with TP1, there were no significant changes in ALFF values at TP2. In the two HC groups, there were no significant changes in ALFF at corresponding intervals. We concluded that for breast cancer patients receiving NAC, ALFF values declined significantly in some brain regions after one cycle of NAC and then remained stable until the completion of NAC, and most of the brain regions with ALFF changes were located in the frontal lobe.