TY - JOUR
T1 - Thalamic fractional anisotropy predicts accrual of cerebral white matter damage in older subjects with small-vessel disease
AU - Cavallari, Michele
AU - Moscufo, Nicola
AU - Meier, Dominik
AU - Skudlarski, Pawel
AU - Pearlson, Godfrey D.
AU - White, William B.
AU - Wolfson, Leslie
AU - Guttmann, Charles R.G.
N1 - Copyright:
Copyright 2014 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2014/8
Y1 - 2014/8
N2 - White matter hyperintensities (WMHs) and lacunes are magnetic resonance imaging hallmarks of cerebral small-vessel disease, which increase the risk of stroke, cognitive, and mobility impairment. Although most studies of cerebral small-vessel disease have focused on white matter abnormalities, the gray matter (GM) is also affected, as evidenced by frequently observed lacunes in subcortical GM. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) is sensitive to subtle neurodegenerative changes in deep GM structures. We explored the relationship between baseline DTI characteristics of the thalamus, caudate, and putamen, and the volume and subsequent accrual of WMHs over a 4-year period in 56 community-dwelling older (≥75 years) individuals. Baseline thalamic fractional anisotropy (FA) was an independent predictor of WMH accrual. WMH accrual also correlated with baseline lacune count and baseline WMH volume, the latter showing the strongest predictive power, explaining 27.3% of the variance. The addition of baseline thalamic FA in multivariate modeling increased this value by 70%, which explains 46.5% of the variance in WMH accrual rate. Thalamic FA might serve as a novel predictor of cerebral small-vessel disease progression in clinical settings and trials. Furthermore, our findings point to the possibility of a causal relationship between thalamic damage and the accrual of WMHs.
AB - White matter hyperintensities (WMHs) and lacunes are magnetic resonance imaging hallmarks of cerebral small-vessel disease, which increase the risk of stroke, cognitive, and mobility impairment. Although most studies of cerebral small-vessel disease have focused on white matter abnormalities, the gray matter (GM) is also affected, as evidenced by frequently observed lacunes in subcortical GM. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) is sensitive to subtle neurodegenerative changes in deep GM structures. We explored the relationship between baseline DTI characteristics of the thalamus, caudate, and putamen, and the volume and subsequent accrual of WMHs over a 4-year period in 56 community-dwelling older (≥75 years) individuals. Baseline thalamic fractional anisotropy (FA) was an independent predictor of WMH accrual. WMH accrual also correlated with baseline lacune count and baseline WMH volume, the latter showing the strongest predictive power, explaining 27.3% of the variance. The addition of baseline thalamic FA in multivariate modeling increased this value by 70%, which explains 46.5% of the variance in WMH accrual rate. Thalamic FA might serve as a novel predictor of cerebral small-vessel disease progression in clinical settings and trials. Furthermore, our findings point to the possibility of a causal relationship between thalamic damage and the accrual of WMHs.
KW - aging
KW - deep gray matter
KW - diffusion tensor imaging
KW - magnetic resonance imaging
KW - small-vessel disease
KW - white matter hyperintensities
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U2 - 10.1038/jcbfm.2014.86
DO - 10.1038/jcbfm.2014.86
M3 - Article
C2 - 24824915
AN - SCOPUS:84905439128
VL - 34
SP - 1321
EP - 1327
JO - Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism
JF - Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism
SN - 0271-678X
IS - 8
ER -