ABSTRACT
Objective:To investigate the possible pathological mechanisms of tardive dyskinesia (TD) by analyzing brain cortex morphological changes and it's correlation to abnormal involuntary movement in schizophrenic patients with TD.Methods:Thirty-two schizophrenia patients with TD (TD group),31 schizophrenia patients without TD (non-TD group) and 21 healthy volunteers (control group) were recruited.Combined TD and non TD group into schizophrenia group.The psychopathological symptoms and abnormal involuntary movement were assessed with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) and Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale (AIMS).The brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data and Freesurfer software were used to measure the gray matter volume,cortical thickness,cortical surface area and volume of sub-conical regions among the three groups.Results:Schizophrenia group had significantly smaller gray matter volume in right nucleus accumbens,bilateral hippocampus,left superior frontal gyrus,left precentral sulcus superior part,and cortical surface area in left precentral sulcus superior part than the controls.The TD group had significantly smaller gray matter volume in right nucleus accumbens,larger gyrus gray matter volume and conical surface area in left precentral sulcus superior part than non-TD group (Ps ＜ 0.05).To test the difference between TD and non-TD group further,the chlorpromazine equivalent dose and PANSS negative scores Was controlled,the TD group still had significantly larger gray matter volume and surface area in left precentral sulcus superior part than the non-TD group [(2.03 ±0.07) × 103mm3 vs.(1.68-± 0.07) × 103 mm3,(1.01 ± 0.03) × 103 mm2 vs.(0.84 ± 0.03) × 103 mm2;Ps ＜ 0.05].Correlation analyses showed in schizophrenia group the cortical thickness in right inferior frontal gyrus correlated negatively with PANSS positive and general scores,positively with total scores;cortical volume in left occipital temporal sulcus correlated negatively with PANSS general and total scores,right inferior frontal gyrus correlated positively with PANSS positive scores,right intraparietal sulcus correlated positively with PANSS positive scores.In TD group,the cortical volume in left precentral sulcus superior part correlated positively with AIMS scores (r =0.46,P ＜0.01).Conclusions:The schizophrenia patients with TD had significantly increased gray matter volume and cortical surface area in left precentral sulcus superior part,which suggested there were motion compensation in the left precentral sulcus superior part in the pathogenesis of TD.
ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the morphological abnormalities of the brain cortex in schizophrenic patients and their parents. Methods We recruited 33 schizophrenic patients, 63 their unaffected biological parents. Thirty well matched healthy controls served as control group 1 (for patients), and 28 well matched healthy controls as control group 2 (for parents). The high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and Freesurfer software were used to measure the gray matter volume, cortical thickness, cortical surface area, curvature and volume of subcortical regions on all the sub-jects. Results The patients demonstrated significant reduction of cortical thickness in the left middle-anterior cingulate, middle occipital gyrus, inferior circular sulcus of the insula, lateral occipito-temporal sulcus, the right lateral occipito-temporal gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, superior circular sulcus of the insula, inferior temporal sulcus, the bilateral poste-rior-dorsalcingulated gyrus and superior temporal sulcus (P<6.0×10-4,corrected by Bonferroni method). Compared with control group 2, the unaffected parents exhibited slight reduction of cortical in the left subcentral, triangular part of the in-ferior frontal gyrus, middle frontal gyrus, superior circular sulcus of the insula, occipital pole, inferior frontal sulcus, mid-dle occipital sulcus and lunatus sulcus, lateral orbital sulcus, the right middle occipital gyrus, lingual gyrus, posterior lat- eral sulcus and inferior precentral sulcus, but the reduction was not significant after correction for multiple comparisons. Conclusions Our results indicate that cortical thickness can specifically reflect the brain morphological abnormalities of schizophrenia and the reduction of cortical thicknes may be a heritable phenotype of schizophrenia.