Analysis of the basal state of nodes in the sensorimotor functional network by means of rs-f MRI in post-Covid 19 pediatric patients

After the pandemic caused by the outbreak of Covid 19 in Wuhan, China, there have been numerous reports of consequences associated with cognitive performance in adults that have been encapsulated under the nickname of ^Long Covid [Asadi-Pooya et al., 2022]. However, little has been mentioned about the affectations after contagion in the pediatric population. Under this premise, we decided to conduct a functional analysis using clinical images obtained by MRI in Post-Covid 19 pediatric patients, where the behavior of the basal state of the brains of these patients was analyzed and contrasted with the functional analysis of a Control group of 31 clinically healthy pediatric patients with no history of Covid 19 or adjacent afflictions. The statistical analysis of the images required adequate preprocessing and was carried out using the CONN tool: connectivity toolbox, which uses functions of the SPM software developed for MATLAB [Whitfield-Gabrieli et al., 2012]. The results showed statistically significant differences (p-FDR <0.05) in the temporal correlations between nodes of different functional networks, including nodes of the Superior Sensorimotor networks (associated with integration of intentional movements [Podgorski et al, 2021] anti –correlated with nodes in the Left Lateral Sensorimotor network (associated with the planning of complex movements [Agarwal, 2018]. The symptoms associated with these findings are still under observation. (author)