Striatal gray matter loss in Huntington's disease is leftward biased.
In Huntington's disease (HD), the distribution of pathological changes throughout the brain is incompletely understood. Some studies have identified leftward-biased lateralization, whereas others did not. We performed magnetic resonance imaging and a voxel-based asymmetry analysis in 44 right-handed HD gene carriers (presymptomatic, n = 5; stage I, n = 28; stage II, n = 11) and 44 right-handed healthy controls. The group comparison revealed leftward-biased gray matter loss in the striatum. Further analyses showed no indication of asymmetry in presymptomatic HD patients but an increase in asymmetry in the course of the HD stages under examination. Our study demonstrates and discusses leftward-biased gray matter loss in HD.
Mühlau
Mark
M
Department of Neurology, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany. m.muehlau@neuro.med.tum.de
Gaser
Christian
C
Wohlschläger
Afra M
AM
Weindl
Adolf
A
Städtler
Michael
M
Valet
Michael
M
Zimmer
Claus
C
Kassubek
Jan
J
Peinemann
Alexander
A
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001921:Brain / Q000473:pathology*; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology; D003342:Corpus Striatum / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D006816:Huntington Disease / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000473:pathology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009410:Nerve Degeneration / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000473:pathology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D012720:Severity of Illness Index