ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the value of neurite orientation dispersion and density imaging (NODDI) in quantitative evaluation of the microstructural changes in basal ganglia and thalamus in Wilson's disease (WD) patients,and to assess the diagnostic efficacy of NODDI.Methods Totally 27 WD patients (WD group) and 26 age-and sex-matched controls (control group) were enrolled.All subjects underwent MR scanning with NODDI.Parameters of NODDI,including intracellular volume fraction (Vic),orientation dispersion index (ODI) and isotropic volume fraction (Viso) of bilateral caudate nucleus,globus pallidus,putamen and thalamus were compared between the 2 groups.Correlation analysis was performed between each parameter of NODDI and clinical Young scores.Random Forest model was used to assess the relative importance of each parameter and to evaluate the diagnostic efficacy.Results The Vic and ODI of bilateral caudate nucleus,globus pallidus and putamen in WD patients were significantly lower than those in normal controls (all P＜0.05),while Viso was significantly higher than that in normal controls (all P＜0.05).The Vic of bilateral thalamus was lower,while Viso was higher in WD patients than those in normal controls (all P＜0.05),and ODI had no significant difference between the 2 groups (P=0.055).In WD patients,Vic and ODI of bilateral caudate nucleus,globus pallidus and putamen were negatively correlated with clinical Young scores.Viso of globus pallidus and putamen were positively correlated with clinical scores.The prediction accuracy of NODDI was 96.23％,and the area under ROC curve was 0.96.Conclusion NODDI can effectively evaluate changes in microstructures and metabolism during copper deposition in WD patients,and it may be useful in detecting changes of brain deep nuclei and assessing the progression of WD.