Kanaan Richard, Barker Gareth, Brammer Michael, Giampietro Vincent, Shergill Sukhwinder, Woolley James, Picchioni Marco, Toulopoulou Timothea, McGuire Philip
Institute of Psychiatry, Department of Psychological Medicine, King's College London, PO 62, Denmark Hill, London SE5 9RJ, UK.
Br J Psychiatry. 2009 Mar;194(3):236-42. doi: 10.1192/bjp.bp.108.054320.
Diffusion tensor magnetic resonance imaging studies in schizophrenia to date have been largely inconsistent. This may reflect variation in methodology, and the use of small samples with differing illness duration and medication exposure.
To determine the extent and location of white matter microstructural changes in schizophrenia, using optimised diffusion tensor imaging in a large patient sample, and to consider the effects of illness duration and medication exposure.
Scans from 76 patients with schizophrenia and 76 matched controls were used to compare fractional anisotropy, a measure of white matter microstructural integrity, between the groups.
We found widespread clusters of reduced fractional anisotropy in patients, affecting most major white matter tracts. These reductions did not correlate with illness duration, and there was no difference between age-matched chronically and briefly medicated patients.
The finding of widespread fractional anisotropy reductions in our larger sample of patients with schizophrenia may explain some of the inconsistent findings of previous, smaller studies.
迄今为止，针对精神分裂症的扩散张量磁共振成像研究结果大多不一致。这可能反映出方法学上的差异，以及使用了疾病持续时间和药物暴露情况各异的小样本。
通过在大量患者样本中运用优化后的扩散张量成像，确定精神分裂症患者白质微观结构变化的程度和位置，并考量疾病持续时间和药物暴露的影响。
对76例精神分裂症患者和76例匹配的对照者进行扫描，以比较两组之间作为白质微观结构完整性指标的分数各向异性。
我们发现患者中存在广泛的分数各向异性降低簇，影响到大多数主要白质束。这些降低与疾病持续时间无关，年龄匹配的长期和短期用药患者之间也无差异。
在我们更大规模的精神分裂症患者样本中发现广泛的分数各向异性降低，这或许可以解释先前较小规模研究中一些不一致的结果。
