title: Correlations between ventricular enlargement and gray and white matter volumes of cortex, thalamus, striatum, and internal capsule in schizophrenia.
abstract: Ventricular enlargement is one of the most consistent abnormal structural brain findings in schizophrenia and has been used to infer brain shrinkage. However, whether ventricular enlargement is related to local overlying cortex and/or adjacent subcortical structures or whether it is related to brain volume change globally has not been assessed. We systematically assessed interrelations of ventricular volumes with gray and white matter volumes of 40 Brodmann areas (BAs), the thalamus and its medial dorsal nucleus and pulvinar, the internal capsule, caudate and putamen. We acquired structural MRI ( patients with schizophrenia (n = 64) and healthy controls (n = 56)) and diffusion tensor fractional anisotropy (FA) (untreated schizophrenia n = 19, controls n = 32). Volumes were assessed by manual tracing of central structures and a semi-automated parcellation of BAs. Patients with schizophrenia had increased ventricular size associated with decreased cortical gray matter volumes widely across the brain; a similar but less pronounced pattern was seen in normal controls; local correlations (e.g. temporal horn with temporal lobe volume) were not appreciably higher than non-local correlations (e.g. temporal horn with prefrontal volume). White matter regions adjacent to the ventricles similarly did not reveal strong regional relationships. FA and center of mass of the anterior limb of the internal capsule also appeared differentially influenced by ventricular volume but findings were similarly not regional. Taken together, these findings indicate that ventricular enlargement is globally interrelated with gray matter volume diminution but not directly correlated with volume loss in the immediately adjacent caudate, putamen, or internal capsule.
authors: Department of Psychiatry, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, One Gustave L. Levy Place, Box 1230, New York, NY 10029, USA.
authors: Guillermo
authors: G
authors: Horga
authors: Javier
authors: J
authors: Bernacer
authors: Nicola
authors: N
authors: Dusi
authors: Jonathan
authors: J
authors: Entis
authors: Kingwai
authors: K
authors: Chu
authors: Erin A
authors: EA
authors: Hazlett
authors: M Mehmet
authors: MM
authors: Haznedar
authors: Eileen
authors: E
authors: Kemether
authors: William
authors: W
authors: Byne
authors: Monte S
authors: MS
authors: Buchsbaum
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000473:pathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002552:Cerebral Ventricles / Q000503:physiopathology*; D003342:Corpus Striatum / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D020772:Internal Capsule / Q000473:pathology; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009413:Nerve Fibers, Myelinated / Q000473:pathology*; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D013788:Thalamus / Q000473:pathology; D055815:Young Adult