White Matter Microstructure By Diffusion Tensor Imaging And Gray Matter Morphological Study Of First-Episode Schizophrenia

Part 1 White Matter Microstructure in First-episode Schizophrenia: Diffusion Tensor Imaging Study Using Tract-Based Spatial Statistics Analysis Objective The present study was aimed to examine the white-matter(WM)microstructural changes in first-episode schizophrenia patients(FES).Method Diffusion tensor imaging(DTI)scan was performed for 39 first-episode schizophrenia patients and 39 healthy controls.Tract-based spatial statistics(TBSS)were adopted to examine the between-group differences in DTI measures including fractional anisotropy(FA),axial diffusivity(AD),radial diffusivity(RD)and mean diffusivity(MD).Multiple comparisons were corrected using the threshold-free cluster enhancement(TFCE)method.FA,AD,RD and MD values of the white matter tracts which showed abnormal morphological differences were extracted,averaged and correlated with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale(PANSS)value in patients group.Results Compared with the healthy control group,FES patients showed increased FA and decreased AD,RD,MD mainly in right sagittal stratum,right posterior thalamic radiate,bilateral cerebral peduncle,right internal and external capsule,corpus callosum,right superior longitudinal fasciculus and right superior corona radiate(P<0.05,TFCE correction).Pearson correlation analysis showed MD values of the fornix was positively correlated with the general psychopathology scores(r=0.36,P=0.02),RD value of the body of corpus callosum was positively correlated with the general psychopathology scores and PANSS scores(r=0.34,P=0.03;r=0.56,P<0.001),and RD value of the splenium of corpus callosum was positively correlated with PANSS scores(r=0.30,P=0.04).Conclusion Patients with first-episode schizophrenia may have a broader range of white matter myelin abnormalities and(or)axonal injuries.Part 2 Voxel-based Morphological study of magnetic resonance brain structure in patients with first-episode schizophrenia Objective To investigate the morphological changes of magnetic resonance brain structure of patients with first-episode schizophrenia(FES).Method High-resolution T1 MRI images of brain in 86 patients with first-episode schizophrenia and 86 age-and gender-matched healthy controls(HCs)were collected.Voxel-based morphometry(VBM)analysis was carried out using FMRIB software library(FSL)5.0.Results FSL-VBM revealed widespread grey matter(GM)volume reductions in FES patients compared with HCs including precentral gyrus,superior frontal gyrus,middle frontal gyrus,inferior frontal gyrus,medial frontal gyrus,postcentral gyrus,inferior parietal lobule,superior parietal lobule,supramarginal gyrus,superior temporal gyrus,middle temporal gyrus,anterior cingulate cortex,middle cingulate cortex and supplementary motor area,but increased GM volume within cerebellum(P<0.05,TFCE corrected).Conclusion Patients with first-episode schizophrenia may have a wide range of brain changes within the cortices during the earlier stages of the illness.