Cortical grey matter alterations in idiopathic restless legs syndrome: An optimized voxel-based morphometry study

Area of Science:

• Neuroimaging
• Neurology
• Neuroscience

Background:

• Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) is thought to involve impaired central somatosensory processing.
• Functional neuroimaging studies indicate widespread functional brain changes in RLS.
• However, structural cortical changes associated with RLS have not been previously reported.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate potential structural alterations in cortical gray matter volume in patients with idiopathic RLS.
• To explore the relationship between these structural changes and RLS symptom severity and disease duration.

Main Methods:

• High-resolution three-dimensional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was used.
• Optimized voxel-based morphometry was applied to analyze gray matter volume.
• The study included 63 patients with idiopathic RLS and a control group.

Main Results:

• Significant regional decreases in gray matter volume were found in the bihemispheric primary somatosensory cortex of RLS patients compared to controls (corrected P < 0.05).
• These gray matter reductions extended into the left-sided primary motor areas.
• The affected brain regions showed correlations with both RLS symptom severity and disease duration.

Conclusions:

• This study provides the first in vivo evidence of structural neocortical gray matter alterations in patients with RLS.
• The observed alterations in the sensorimotor cortices may contribute to the understanding of the pathophysiology of idiopathic RLS.