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Cortical thickness and sulcal depth: insights on development and psychopathology in paediatric epilepsy
Duygu Tosun1, Prabha Siddarth2, Jennifer Levitt3
1, PhD, Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California - San Francisco, California, and Center for Imaging of Neurodegenerative Diseases, San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, San Francisco, California, USA.
Insights
Children with focal epilepsy and psychiatric diagnoses show altered cortical thickness-sulcal depth relationships. These brain changes may serve as a biomarker for psychopathology in pediatric epilepsy.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Neuroscience
- Pediatric Neurology
Background:
- Cortical thickness (CThick) and sulcal depth (SDepth) relationships vary across brain regions during development.
- Children with epilepsy exhibit CThick and SDepth abnormalities and frequently have comorbid psychiatric disorders.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare the CThick-SDepth relationship in children with focal epilepsy versus typically developing children (TDC).
- To investigate the influence of seizure history and psychopathology on the CThick-SDepth relationship in pediatric epilepsy.
Main Methods:
- Utilized surface-based, high-resolution 3D MRI analysis to compare regional CThick-SDepth correlations.
- Included 42 children with focal epilepsy and 46 TDC (ages 6-16).
- Assessed psychiatric diagnoses via interviews and collected seizure information from parents.
Main Results:
- Typically developing children (TDC) showed a negative medial fronto-orbital CThick-SDepth correlation.
- Focal epilepsy participants with psychiatric diagnoses exhibited positive pre-central and post-central CThick-SDepth associations, unlike TDC.
- Prolonged seizures correlated with post-central CThick-SDepth changes but not psychiatric diagnoses.
Conclusions:
- Abnormal CThick-SDepth associations in the pre-central and post-central regions may indicate psychopathology in pediatric focal epilepsy.
- These findings suggest potential neuroimaging biomarkers for psychiatric comorbidities in childhood epilepsy.
Background:
The relationship between cortical thickness (CThick) and sulcal depth (SDepth) changes across brain regions during development. Epilepsy youth have CThick and SDepth abnormalities and prevalent psychiatric disorders.
Aims:
This study compared the CThick-SDepth relationship in children with focal epilepsy with typically developing children (TDC) and the role played by seizure and psychopathology variables.
Method:
A surface-based, computational high-resolution three-dimesional (3D) magnetic resonance image analytic technique compared regional CThick-SDepth relationships in 42 participants with focal epilepsy and 46 TDC (6-16 years) imaged in a 1.5 Tesla scanner. Psychiatric interviews administered to each participant yielded psychiatric diagnoses. Parents provided seizure-related information.
Results:
The TDC group alone demonstrated a significant negative medial fronto-orbital CThick-SDepth correlation. Focal epilepsy participants with but not without psychiatric diagnoses showed significant positive pre-central and post-central CThick-SDepth associations not found in TDC. Although the history of prolonged seizures was significantly associated with the post-central CThick-SDepth correlation, it was unrelated to the presence/absence of psychiatric diagnoses.
Conclusions:
Abnormal CThick-SDepth pre-central and post-central associations might be a psychopathology biomarker in paediatric focal epilepsy.
Declaration Interest:
None.
Copyright And Usage:
© 2015 The Royal College of Psychiatrists. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Non-Commercial, No Derivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) licence.
