Abstract
Background
Cumulative evidence of microvascular dysfunction has suggested the blood-brain barrier
(BBB) disruption in schizophrenia, while the direct in vivo evidence from patients is inadequate. In this study, using dynamic contrast-enhanced
magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) methods, we tried to test the hypothesis that
there was increased BBB permeability in schizophrenia patients, and correlated with
the clinical characters, and brain volumetric alterations.
Methods
Structural MRI and DCE-MRI data from 29 schizophrenia patients and 18 age- and sex-
matched controls (HC) were obtained. We calculated the volume transfer constant (Ktrans) value and compared the difference between two groups. The regions with the abnormal
Ktrans value were extracted as ROIs (thalamus), and the correlation with the clinical characters
and grey matter volume were analysed.
Results
The results revealed that, compared with the HC, the volume transfer constant (Ktrans) value of the bilateral thalamus in the schizophrenia group was increased (p < 0.001).
There were significant positive correlations between thalamic mean Ktrans value with disease duration (p < 0.05) and symptom severity (p < 0.001). Analysis
of the thalamic subregions revealed that the BBB disruption was significant in pulvinar,
especially the medial pulvinar nucleus (PuM) and lateral pulvinar nucleus (PuL) (p
< 0.001). The Ktrans value of the whole brain, thalamus, and thalamic subregions was negatively correlated
with their volume separately.
Conclusion
These results provided the first in vivo evidence of BBB disruption of thalamus in schizophrenia patients, and the BBB dysfunction
might contribute to the pathological brain structural alterations in schizophrenia.
Key words
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Article Info
Publication History
Accepted:
June 8,
2022
Received in revised form:
June 7,
2022
Received:
February 13,
2022
Publication stage
In Press Journal Pre-ProofFootnotes
Conflict of interests
The authors report no biomedical financial interests or potential conflicts of interest.
Identification
Copyright
© 2022 Published by Elsevier Inc on behalf of Society of Biological Psychiatry.