title: Progression of microstructural putamen alterations in a case of symptomatic recurrent seizures using diffusion tensor imaging.
abstract: Microstructural alterations of the putamen were recently reported in patients with partial and generalized epilepsy disorders. However, it is unknown whether these alterations pre-exist or are secondary to recurrent seizures. Here we investigated the progression of putamen fractional anisotropy (FA) alterations in a case of recurrent psychomotor seizures using longitudinal diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) shortly before (DTI-1) and after a psychomotor seizure (DTI-2). We obtained FA values of a hypothesis-guided putamen region-of-interest (ROI) and seven exploratory ROIs. FA values from both DTIs were compared with reference values from 19 controls. Relative to controls, the patient's putamen FA was increased at DTI-1 (13% left putamen, 7% right putamen), an effect that was exacerbated at DTI-2 (24% left putamen (p<0.05), 20% right putamen). In the exploratory ROIs we found FA reductions in the corticospinal tract, temporal lobe, and occipital lobe (p<0.05) relative to controls at DTI-1 and DTI-2. In contrast to the putamen, all exploratory ROIs showed no relevant FA change between DTI-1 and DTI-2. These results suggest that recurrent seizures may lead to progressive microstructural putamen alterations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, University of Münster, Germany.
authors.forename: Jan S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Gerdes
authors.forename: Simon S
authors.initials: SS
authors.lastname: Keller
authors.forename: Wolfram
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Schwindt
authors.forename: Stefan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Evers
authors.forename: Siawoosh
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mohammadi
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Deppe
mesh_terms: D016880:Anisotropy; D056324:Diffusion Tensor Imaging; D018450:Disease Progression; D004828:Epilepsies, Partial / Q000150:complications / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D011699:Putamen / Q000473:pathology*; D012008:Recurrence; D012640:Seizures / Q000209:etiology / Q000473:pathology*