title: Classification of first-episode schizophrenia patients and healthy subjects by automated MRI measures of regional brain volume and cortical thickness.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Although structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies have repeatedly demonstrated regional brain structural abnormalities in patients with schizophrenia, relatively few MRI-based studies have attempted to distinguish between patients with first-episode schizophrenia and healthy controls.
  
  
  METHODS
  Three-dimensional MR images were acquired from 52 (29 males, 23 females) first-episode schizophrenia patients and 40 (22 males, 18 females) healthy subjects. Multiple brain measures (regional brain volume and cortical thickness) were calculated by a fully automated procedure and were used for group comparison and classification by linear discriminant function analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Schizophrenia patients showed gray matter volume reductions and cortical thinning in various brain regions predominantly in prefrontal and temporal cortices compared with controls. The classifiers obtained from 66 subjects of the first group successfully assigned 26 subjects of the second group with accuracy above 80%.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results showed that combinations of automated brain measures successfully differentiated first-episode schizophrenia patients from healthy controls. Such neuroimaging approaches may provide objective biological information adjunct to clinical diagnosis of early schizophrenia.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neuropsychiatry, University of Toyama, Toyama, Japan. y-takayanagi@sky.707.to
authors.forename: Yoichiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Takayanagi
authors.forename: Tsutomu
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Takahashi
authors.forename: Lina
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Orikabe
authors.forename: Yuriko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Mozue
authors.forename: Yasuhiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kawasaki
authors.forename: Kazue
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Nakamura
authors.forename: Yoko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Sato
authors.forename: Masanari
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Itokawa
authors.forename: Hidenori
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yamasue
authors.forename: Kiyoto
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kasai
authors.forename: Masayoshi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kurachi
authors.forename: Yuji
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Okazaki
authors.forename: Michio
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Suzuki
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000473:pathology*; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology