Relationships between brain functional connectivity and resting cardiac autonomic profiles in functional neurological disorder: A pilot study.

Overview

1. Mass General Brigham Department of Neurology, Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston MA, USA
2. Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
3. Department of Occupational Therapy, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
4. Department of Physical Therapy, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
5. Computational Neuroimaging Lab, Biobizkaia Health Research Institute, Barakaldo, Spain
6. Ikerbasque Baske Foundation for Science, Bilbao, Spain
7. Center for Inflammation Imaging, Department of Radiology, Mass General Brigham, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
8. Mass General Brigham Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
9. Department of Psychology, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA

Abstract

Background: Functional neurological disorder (FND) is associated with alterations in functional brain networks, yet relationships between peripheral autonomic physiology and brain architecture remain poorly characterized. This pilot study examined associations between cardiac autonomic metrics and resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) in FND.

Methods: Twenty females with FND and 23 age-matched female psychiatric controls (PCs) completed questionnaires, 10-min resting photoplethysmography recordings, and same-day resting-state fMRI. Interbeat interval (IBI) and heart rate variability (HRV) metrics were extracted. Whole-brain rsFC was quantified using weighted-degree [centrality]. Within-group analyses tested associations between cardiac autonomic metrics and weighted-degree rsFC separately in FND and PC cohorts, adjusting for age, head motion, and antidepressant/β-blocker use – while applying a cluster-wise correction.

Results: Cardiac (IBI and HRV) metrics did not differ between FND and PC cohorts, and these metrics did not correlate with FND symptom severity, somatic symptom burden, affective symptoms, or childhood trauma. In FND, shorter IBI (i.e., faster resting heart rate) correlated with higher weighted-degree rsFC in bilateral supplementary motor area (SMA) and right precentral/superior frontal regions, whereas lower HRV primarily correlated with higher weighted-degree rsFC in the bilateral SMA, mid-cingulate cortex, and right amygdala, anterior insula, and lateral orbitofrontal cortex. In PCs, autonomic–rsFC associations were more spatially restricted to the bilateral anterior/mid-cingulate and SMA.

Conclusion: In FND, individual differences in resting autonomic physiology related to the centrality of brain areas that are part of the central autonomic, salience, and allostatic-interoceptive networks. These findings suggest that the relationship between autonomic physiology and network architecture may be important in FND.

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

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For qualified researchers, analysis code and de-identified data pertaining only to study results can be made available upon reasonable request and following approval by the local internal review board.

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Version 1, 29 September 2026: the first record

Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, pages, dates, 11 authors, 6 keywords, 13 MeSH terms, 2 funders, 99 references.

Cite

This paper

Bleier, C., Guthrie, A. J., Ranford, J., MacLean, J., Godena, E., Maggio, J., Finkelstein, S. A., Diez, I., Westlin, C., Quigley, K. S., & Perez, D. L. (2026). Relationships between brain functional connectivity and resting cardiac autonomic profiles in functional neurological disorder: A pilot study. NeuroImage. Clinical, 50, 103996. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nicl.2026.103996

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