TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2016//
TI  - Brain responses to disorder-related visual threat in panic disorder
JO  - Human brain mapping
A1  - Feldker, Katharina
A1  - Heitmann, Carina Yvonne
A1  - Neumeister, Paula
A1  - Bruchmann, Maximilian
A1  - Vibrans, Laura
A1  - Zwitserlood, Pienie
A1  - Straube, Thomas
SP  - 4439
EP  - 4453
VL  - 37
IS  - 12
N2  - Panic disorder (PD) patients show aberrant neural responses to threatening stimuli in an extended fear network, but results are only partially comparable, and studies implementing disorder-related visual scenes are lacking as stimuli. The neural responses and functional connectivity to a newly developed set of disorder-related, ecologically valid scenes as compared with matched neutral visual scenes, using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in 26 PD patients and 26 healthy controls (HC) were investigated. PD patients versus HC showed hyperactivation in an extended fear network comprising brainstem, insula, thalamus, anterior, and mid-cingulate cortex and (dorso-)medial prefrontal cortex for disorder-related versus neutral scenes. Amygdala differences between groups failed significance. Subjective levels of anxiety significantly correlated with brainstem activation in PD patients. Analysis of functional connectivity by means of beta series correlation revealed no emotion-specific alterations in connectivity in PD patients versus HC. The results suggest that subjective anxiety evoked by external stimuli is directly related to altered activation in the homeostatic alarm system in PD. With novel disorder-related stimuli, the study sheds new light on the neural underpinnings of pathological threat processing in PD. Hum Brain Mapp, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.<br><br>© 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.<p />  <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 1065-9471
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/hbm.23320
ID  - ref1
ER  -