Zhang You-Ming, Chen Ming-Na, Yi Xiao-Ping, Li Li, Gao Jian-Ming, Zhang Jin-Lei, Yuan Xin-Ru, Zhang Na, Liu Li-Zhi, Cai Pei-Qiang, Chen Bihong T, Zee Chishing, Liao Wei-Hua, Zhang Yuan-Chao
Department of Radiology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China.
Department of Ultrasonic Imaging, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China.
Front Neurosci. 2018 Aug 27;12:599. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2018.00599. eCollection 2018.
Radiation encephalopathy (RE) is one of the most severe complications in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) patients after radiotherapy (RT). However, the morphological alteration of early RE is insufficiently investigated. We aimed to investigate the cortical thickness and surface area alterations in NPC patients with or without RE in the follow-up. A total of 168 NPC patients each underwent a single scan and analysis at various times either Pre-RT ( = 56) or Post-RT ( = 112). We further divided the Post-RT NPC patients into three groups based on the time of the analysis following RT (Post-RT and Post-RT) or whether RE signs were detected in the analysis (Post-RT). We confined the vertex-wise analyses of the cortical thickness and surface area to the bilateral temporal lobes. Interestingly, we revealed a gradual increase in the cortical surface area of the temporal lobe with increasing time after RT within the Post-RT group, consistent with the between-group findings, which showed a significant increase in cortical surface area in the Post-RT group relative to the Pre-RT group and the Post-RT group. By contrast, such a trend was not observed in the cortical thickness findings. We concluded that the cortical surface area, rather than cortical thickness, may serve as a potential biomarker for early diagnosis of RE.
放射性脑病（RE）是鼻咽癌（NPC）患者放疗（RT）后最严重的并发症之一。然而，早期RE的形态学改变尚未得到充分研究。我们旨在调查随访中有无RE的NPC患者的皮质厚度和表面积变化。共有168例NPC患者在放疗前（n = 56）或放疗后（n = 112）的不同时间分别接受了一次扫描和分析。我们根据放疗后分析的时间（放疗后1年和放疗后3年）或分析中是否检测到RE征象（放疗后有RE），将放疗后的NPC患者进一步分为三组。我们将皮质厚度和表面积的逐点分析限定在双侧颞叶。有趣的是，我们发现放疗后组中，随着放疗后时间的增加，颞叶皮质表面积逐渐增加，这与组间结果一致，即放疗后1年组相对于放疗前组和放疗后有RE组，皮质表面积显著增加。相比之下，皮质厚度结果未观察到这种趋势。我们得出结论，皮质表面积而非皮质厚度可能作为RE早期诊断的潜在生物标志物。
