title: Basal ganglia volume in unmedicated patients with schizophrenia is associated with treatment response to antipsychotic medication.
abstract: We investigated the relationship between basal ganglia volume and treatment response to the atypical antipsychotic medication risperidone in unmedicated patients with schizophrenia. Basal ganglia volumes included the bilateral caudate, putamen, and pallidum and were measured using the Freesurfer automated segmentation pipeline in 23 subjects. Also, baseline symptom severity, duration of illness, age, gender, time off medication, and exposure to previous antipsychotic were measured. Treatment response was significantly correlated with all three regions of the bilateral basal ganglia (caudate, putamen, and pallidum), baseline symptom severity, duration of illness, and age but not gender, time off antipsychotic medication, or exposure to previous antipsychotic medication. The caudate volume was the basal ganglia region that demonstrated the strongest correlation with treatment response and was significantly negatively correlated with patient age. Caudate volume was not significantly correlated with any other measure. We demonstrated a novel finding that the caudate volume explains a significant amount of the variance in treatment response over the course of 6 weeks of risperidone pharmacotherapy even when controlling for baseline symptom severity and duration of illness.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurobiology, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL 35294-0017, USA.
authors.forename: Nathan L
authors.initials: NL
authors.lastname: Hutcheson
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA.
authors.forename: David G
authors.initials: DG
authors.lastname: Clark
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA; Department of Vision Sciences, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA.
authors.forename: Mark S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Bolding
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurobiology, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL 35294-0017, USA.
authors.forename: David M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: White
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurobiology, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL 35294-0017, USA. Electronic address: alahti@uab.edu.
authors.forename: Adrienne C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Lahti
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D014150:Antipsychotic Agents / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000627:therapeutic use; D001479:Basal Ganglia / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000473:pathology; D001480:Basal Ganglia Diseases / Q000139:chemically induced / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology; D002421:Caudate Nucleus / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000187:drug effects / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D005917:Globus Pallidus / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000187:drug effects / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009929:Organ Size; D018967:Risperidone / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000627:therapeutic use; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000188:drug therapy*; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013997:Time Factors
chemical_list: D014150:Antipsychotic Agents; D018967:Risperidone
keywords: Basal ganglia; Caudate; Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI); Risperidone; Schizophrenia; Treatment response