Modelling the distribution of cortical lesions in multiple sclerosis

Recent studies have shown the relevance of the cerebral grey matter involvement in multiple sclerosis (MS). Cortical lesions (CLs), detected by specific MRI sequences, are likely to become a new research outcome in MS studies. The aim of this study was to infer the optimal statistical model describing the distribution of CLs in patients with relapsing-remitting (RR)MS. The negative binomial model gave the best fit to the observed distribution of CLs in a group of 44 RRMS patients with one MRI scan of the brain. This observation has important implications for the statistical analysis of CLs in MS studies.