Neural injury of uncinate fasciculus in patients with diffuse axonal injury.
The recent development of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) allows visualization and estimation of the uncinate fasciculus (UF). We investigated injuries of the UF in patients with diffuse axonal injury (DAI) who showed no specific lesions except for DAI lesions on conventional brain MRI. Twenty-one chronic patients with DAI, and 21 age- and sex-matched normal control subjects were recruited for this study. Diffusion tensor images were acquired using a sensitivity-encoding head coil at 1.5 T and the UF was reconstructed using DTI-Studio software. Fractional anisotropy (FA), apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) value, and fiber number of the UF were measured. In the DAI group, the FA values and fiber numbers were significantly decreased compared to those of the control group (P< 0.05). The FA value and fiber number decreased 8.4% and 26.5% in the DAI group compared to those of the control group. By contrast, the ADC value did not show any difference between the DAI and control groups (P> 0.05). Changes in the DTI parameters of the DAI group appeared to indicate neural injury of the UF. We believe that DTI can be a useful evaluation tool for detecting hidden neural injuries of UF in patients with DAI.
Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, College of Medicine, Yeungnam University, Taegu, Republic of Korea.
Jeong Pyo
JP
Seo
Oh Lyong
OL
Kim
Seong Ho
SH
Kim
Min Cheol
MC
Chang
Min-Su
MS
Kim
Su Min
SM
Son
Sung Ho
SH
Jang
D000328:Adult; D016880:Anisotropy; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D020833:Diffuse Axonal Injury / Q000473:pathology*; D056324:Diffusion Tensor Imaging; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008032:Limbic System / Q000473:pathology*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009413:Nerve Fibers, Myelinated / Q000473:pathology*; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000473:pathology*; D055815:Young Adult