Aim: The aim of this study was to obtain temporal pattern and hemispheric dominance of blood flow velocity (BFV) changes and to assess suitability of different cognitive tasks for monitoring of BFV changes in the middle cerebral arteries (MCA).
Methods: BFV were recorded simultaneously in MCA during performance of phonemic verbal fluency test (pVFT), Trail Making Tests A and B (TMTA and TMTB) and Stroop tests in 14 healthy, right-handed volunteers aged 20-26 years.
Results: A significant increase of BFV in both MCA was obtained during performance of all cognitive tasks. Statistically significant lateralization was found during performance of Stroop test with incongruent stimuli, while TMTB was found to have the best activation potential for MCA.
Conclusion: Our findings specify TMTB as the most suitable cognitive test for monitoring of BFV in MCA.
Keywords: Stroop; cognitive tasks; middle cerebral artery; trail making; transcranial Doppler.
© 2014 The Authors. Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences © 2014 Japanese Society of Psychiatry and Neurology.