Salvatore Nigro1, Gaetano Barbagallo2, Maria Giovanna Bianco3, Maurizio Morelli2, Gennarina Arabia2, Andrea Quattrone2, Sara Gasparini4, Giuseppe Lucio Cascini5, Aldo Quattrone6. 1. Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, Magna Graecia University, Catanzaro, Italy. 2. Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, Institute of Neurology, Magna Graecia University, Catanzaro, Italy. 3. Department of Health Sciences, Magna Graecia University, Catanzaro, Italy. 4. Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, Institute of Neurology, Magna Graecia University, Catanzaro, Italy; Regional Epilepsy Center, "Great Metropolitan Hospital", Via Melacrino, Reggio Calabria, Italy. 5. Institute of Radiology, Nuclear Medicine Unit, Magna Graecia University, Catanzaro, Italy. 6. Institute of Bioimaging and Molecular Physiology, National Research Council, Catanzaro, Italy; Neuroscience Center, Magna Graecia University, Catanzaro, Italy. Electronic address: quattrone@unicz.it.
Abstract
INTRODUCTION: Track density imaging (TDI) has been proven to be a useful approach able to investigate white matter (WM) anatomical integrity in several neurodegenerative conditions, such as Parkinson's disease (PD) and classical phenotype of Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP) also known as Richardson's syndrome (RS). To the best of our knowledge, no studies have assessed WM changes in PSP-predominant parkinsonism (PSP-P) patients by using a TDI approach, and no studies have explored the potential role of these changes in discriminating patients with PSP-P from those with PSP-RS and PD. METHODS: We used TDI to characterize WM changes in 31 PSP-P compared to 36 PSP-RS, 36 PD and 37 healthy controls (HC). Then, a support vector machine (SVM) approach was used to evaluate the performance of TDI in discriminating between patient groups. RESULTS: Relative to HC and PD patients, decreased track density in PSP-P patients was found in several WM regions such as the midbrain, superior cerebellar peduncles, cerebellum and corticospinal tract. By contrast, higher values of track density were observed in PSP-P patients compared to PSP-RS. SVM approach using TDI differentiated patients with PSP-P from PD and PSP-RS with an area under the curve of 0.90 and 0.76, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that TDI may represent a useful approach for characterizing WM changes in PSP-P patients representing a potential new MRI biomarker in distinguishing this PSP phenotype from PD.
INTRODUCTION: Track density imaging (TDI) has been proven to be a useful approach able to investigate white matter (WM) anatomical integrity in several neurodegenerative conditions, such as Parkinson's disease (PD) and classical phenotype of Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP) also known as Richardson's syndrome (RS). To the best of our knowledge, no studies have assessed WM changes in PSP-predominant parkinsonism (PSP-P)patients by using a TDI approach, and no studies have explored the potential role of these changes in discriminating patients with PSP-P from those with PSP-RS and PD. METHODS: We used TDI to characterize WM changes in 31 PSP-P compared to 36 PSP-RS, 36 PD and 37 healthy controls (HC). Then, a support vector machine (SVM) approach was used to evaluate the performance of TDI in discriminating between patient groups. RESULTS: Relative to HC and PDpatients, decreased track density in PSP-Ppatients was found in several WM regions such as the midbrain, superior cerebellar peduncles, cerebellum and corticospinal tract. By contrast, higher values of track density were observed in PSP-Ppatients compared to PSP-RS. SVM approach using TDI differentiated patients with PSP-P from PD and PSP-RS with an area under the curve of 0.90 and 0.76, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that TDI may represent a useful approach for characterizing WM changes in PSP-Ppatients representing a potential new MRI biomarker in distinguishing this PSP phenotype from PD.
Authors: Maria Stamelou; Gesine Respondek; Nikolaos Giagkou; Jennifer L Whitwell; Gabor G Kovacs; Günter U Höglinger Journal: Nat Rev Neurol Date: 2021-08-23 Impact factor: 42.937