title: Prefrontal cortex rTMS enhances action naming in progressive non-fluent aphasia.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Progressive non-fluent aphasia (PNFA) is a neurodegenerative disorder that is characterized by non-fluent speech with naming impairment and grammatical errors. It has been recently demonstrated that repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) over the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) improves action naming in healthy subjects and in subjects with Alzheimer's disease.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To investigate whether the modulation of DLPFC circuits by rTMS modifies naming performance in patients with PNFA.
  
  
  METHODS
  Ten patients with a diagnosis of PNFA were enrolled. High-frequency rTMS was applied to the left and right DLPFC and the sham (i.e. placebo) condition during object and action naming. A subgroup of patients with semantic dementia was enrolled as a comparison group.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A repeated-measure anova with stimulus site (sham, left and right rTMS) showed significant effects. Action-naming performances during stimulation of both the left and right DLPFC were better than during placebo stimulation. No facilitating effect of rTMS to the DLPFC on object naming was observed. In patients with a diagnosis of semantic dementia, no effect of stimulation was reported.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our study demonstrated that rTMS improved action naming in subjects with PNFA, possibly due to the modulation of DLPFC pathways and a facilitation effect on lexical retrieval processes. Future studies on the potential of a rehabilitative protocol using rTMS applied to the DLPFC in this orphan disorder are required.
authors.affiliation: IRCCS Centro San Giovanni di Dio Fatebenefratelli, Brescia, Italy. mcotelli@fatebenefratelli.it
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cotelli
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Manenti
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Alberici
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Brambilla
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cosseddu
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Zanetti
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Miozzo
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Padovani
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Miniussi
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Borroni
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D001039:Aphasia, Broca / Q000628:therapy*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D013060:Speech; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon; D050781:Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation