Department of Andrology, Jiangsu Province Hospital of Chinese Medicine, Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China.
Department of Urology, The Affiliated Jiangning Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, China.
Front Endocrinol (Lausanne). 2022 Jul 22;13:817523. doi: 10.3389/fendo.2022.817523. eCollection 2022.
Erectile dysfunction (ED) is a common complication of Type-2 Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) for male patients and it is considered to be associated with different causes including hyperglicemia-induced vascular endothelial cell damages. However, the possible central neural mechanisms shared by these two diseases remain unclear. This study aimed to explore the changes of brain activity and their relationships with the clinical characteristics in patients with diabetic ED.
The data of resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging were acquired in 31 T2DM patients with ED (DM-ED) and 31 matched healthy controls (HCs). The whole-brain regional homogeneity (ReHo) values were calculated and compared between groups. In addition, correlation analysis was performed to evaluate the relationships between brain regions with altered ReHo values and clinical characteristics in the patient group.
The DM-ED group exhibited increased ReHo values in the right middle frontal gyrus (orbital part) and decreased ReHo values in the left superior frontal gyrus (dorsolateral), paracentral lobule, precuneus and bilateral supplementary motor area when compared with the HCs group. Moreover, significantly negative correlations were found between ReHo values of the left superior frontal gyrus (dorsolateral) and IIEF-5 scores, as well as the level of HbA1c in the DM-ED group.
The altered spontaneous brain activity in cognitive-related regions revealed by ReHo values might provide new insights into the neurological pathophysiology underlying DM-ED and serve as potential neuroimaging biomarkers for detecting and evaluating ED in diabetes patients.
勃起功能障碍（ED）是男性 2 型糖尿病（T2DM）患者的常见并发症，其被认为与多种原因有关，包括高血糖引起的血管内皮细胞损伤。然而，这两种疾病可能存在的中枢神经机制尚不清楚。本研究旨在探讨糖尿病 ED 患者脑活动变化及其与临床特征的关系。
对 31 例糖尿病 ED 患者（DM-ED 组）和 31 名匹配的健康对照者（HCs 组）进行静息态功能磁共振成像数据采集。计算全脑局部一致性（ReHo）值并比较两组间的差异。此外，对患者组脑区 ReHo 值与临床特征之间的关系进行相关性分析。
与 HCs 组相比，DM-ED 组右侧额中回（眶部）的 ReHo 值升高，左侧额上回（背外侧部）、顶下小叶、楔前叶和双侧辅助运动区的 ReHo 值降低。此外，DM-ED 组左侧额上回（背外侧部）的 ReHo 值与 IIEF-5 评分和 DM-ED 组的 HbA1c 水平呈显著负相关。
ReHo 值显示与认知相关区域的自发性脑活动改变可能为 DM-ED 的神经病理生理学提供新的见解，并为糖尿病患者的 ED 检测和评估提供潜在的神经影像学生物标志物。
