title: Altered Fractional Anisotropy in Early Huntington's Disease.
abstract: Huntington's disease (HD) is a dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disease best known for chorea. The disorder includes numerous other clinical features including mood disorder, eye movement abnormalities, cognitive disturbance, pendular knee reflexes, motor impersistence, and postural instability. We describe a mild case of HD early in the disease course with depression and subtle neurological manifestations. In addition, we review MRI and diffusion tensor imaging features in this patient. The bicaudate ratio, a measure of caudate atrophy, was increased. Fractional anisotropy values of the bilateral caudate and putamen were increased, signifying neurodegeneration of these structures in HD.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, New York Medical College, Valhalla, N.Y., USA.
authors.forename: Silky
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Singh
authors.forename: Hasit
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Mehta
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Fekete
keywords: Diffusion tensor imaging; Fractional anisotropy; Huntington's disease