Vasconcelos Luciano de Gois, Brucki Sonia Maria Dozzi, Jackowiski Andrea Parolin, Bueno Orlando Francisco Amodeo
MD, Post-Graduate Student of the Psychobiology Department, UNIFESP, Brazil.
MD, PhD, Affiliated researcher of the Psychobiology Department, UNIFESP, Brazil.
Dement Neuropsychol. 2009 Oct-Dec;3(4):268-274. doi: 10.1590/S1980-57642009DN30400002.
In view of the urgent need to identify an early and specific biomarker for Alzheimer's disease (AD), a PubMed database search was performed using the terms "Alzheimer disease" and "Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging" to enable review of Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) concepts and its potential clinical role in AD evaluation. Detailed analysis of selected abstracts showed that the main DTI measures, fractional anisotropy and apparent diffusion coefficient, indicators of fiber tract integrity, provide a direct assessment of WM fibers and may be used as a new biomarker for AD. These findings were found to correlate with cognitive assessments, rates of AD progression and were also able to differentiate among groups including mild cognitive impairment, AD, and other dementias. Despite several consistent DTI findings in AD patients, there is still a lack of knowledge and studies on the DTI field. DTI is not yet ready for clinical use, and requires extensive further research in order to achieve this goal.
鉴于迫切需要确定一种针对阿尔茨海默病（AD）的早期特异性生物标志物，我们使用“阿尔茨海默病”和“扩散磁共振成像”等术语在PubMed数据库中进行了搜索，以便回顾扩散张量成像（DTI）的概念及其在AD评估中的潜在临床作用。对所选摘要的详细分析表明，主要的DTI测量指标，即分数各向异性和表观扩散系数，作为纤维束完整性的指标，可直接评估白质纤维，并且可用作AD的一种新型生物标志物。这些发现与认知评估、AD进展率相关，还能够区分包括轻度认知障碍、AD和其他痴呆症在内的不同组。尽管在AD患者中有一些一致的DTI研究结果，但DTI领域仍缺乏相关知识和研究。DTI尚未准备好用于临床，需要进行广泛的进一步研究才能实现这一目标。
