title: A morphometric analysis of the septal nuclei in schizophrenia and affective disorders: reduced neuronal density in the lateral septal nucleus in bipolar disorder.
abstract: The septal nuclei are assumed to play a significant role in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia and affective disorders. The aim of this study was to morphometrically characterize the septal nuclei in patients with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and major depressive disorder, when compared with healthy control subjects. We analyzed the septal nuclei by determining the density and size of the neurons in postmortem brains in 17 patients with schizophrenia, 8 patients with bipolar disorder, 7 patients with major depressive disorder, and 14 control subjects matched for age and gender. There was a significant reduction in the neuronal density, but not in the mean cross-sectional area, in the lateral septal nucleus (P = 0.013) in patients with bipolar disorder when compared with control subjects. There were no significant changes in the neuronal density of the septal nuclei of the medial and lateral cell groups in patients with schizophrenia and major depressive disorder when compared with control subjects. There was a significant negative correlation between neuronal density in the lateral septal nucleus and disease duration in patients with major depressive disorder (P = 0.037, r = -0.9). The histopathological abnormality of the decreased neuronal density in the lateral septal nucleus, which is an important limbic region involved in emotions, might be a neuropathological correlate of bipolar disorder.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Otto-von-Guericke-University of Magdeburg, Germany. ralfbrisch@hotmail.com
authors.forename: Ralf
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Brisch
authors.forename: Hans-Gert
authors.initials: HG
authors.lastname: Bernstein
authors.forename: Henrik
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Dobrowolny
authors.forename: Dieter
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Krell
authors.forename: Renate
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Stauch
authors.forename: Kurt
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Trübner
authors.forename: Johann
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Steiner
authors.forename: Mounir N
authors.initials: MN
authors.lastname: Ghabriel
authors.forename: Hendrik
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Bielau
authors.forename: Rainer
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Wolf
authors.forename: Jana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Winter
authors.forename: Siegfried
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kropf
authors.forename: Tomasz
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Gos
authors.forename: Bernhard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Bogerts
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001714:Bipolar Disorder / Q000473:pathology*; D002452:Cell Count; D003865:Major Depressive Disorder / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009474:Neurons / Q000473:pathology*; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000473:pathology*; D012686:Septal Nuclei / Q000473:pathology*