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Morphometry analysis of basal ganglia structures in children with obstructive sleep apnea
Insights
Pediatric obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is linked to brain structure changes. Children with OSA showed thalamus atrophy and pallidum dilation, similar to adults but with unique pallidum alterations.
Area of Science:
- Neuroimaging
- Pediatric neurology
- Sleep medicine
Background:
- Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) impacts children and adults, potentially due to brain region deficits.
- While adult OSA structural brain changes are documented, pediatric evidence is limited.
- This study focuses on structural brain alterations in children with OSA, specifically basal ganglia.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate structural brain alterations in children diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA).
- To specifically examine changes within the basal ganglia structures in pediatric OSA.
- To compare structural brain findings in pediatric OSA with those in adult OSA.
Main Methods:
- Recruited 25 children with OSA and 30 healthy controls (mean age ~10 years).
- Utilized T1-weighted brain MRI for automatic brain segmentation.
- Employed surface-based shape analysis to compare basal ganglia structures between groups.
Main Results:
- Significant morphometric differences were observed in the left thalamus and left pallidum.
- Children with OSA exhibited atrophy in specific left thalamus nuclei (ventral posterior, medial dorsal).
- Regional dilation was noted in both internal and external segments of the left pallidum in OSA patients.
Conclusions:
- Structural deficits in the thalamus are associated with pediatric OSA, aligning with adult findings.
- This research offers novel insights into distinct pallidum structural changes in pediatric OSA compared to adults.
- Findings highlight the thalamus and pallidum as key areas affected by OSA in children.
Background:
Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) affects both adults and children, likely mediated by the deficits of various brain regions. The association between structural alterations in the brain and OSA syndrome have been reported in adult patients, but the corresponding evidence for OSA children is still limited.
Objective:
The proposed study aimed to investigate the structural alterations in the brain of children with OSA, with focus on basal ganglia structures.
Methods:
We recruited 25 OSA children (aged 10.3±1.5 years) and 30 healthy children (aged 10.1±1.8 years) with T1-weighted brain MRI and performed automatic segmentation of their brains. The shape alterations of the basal ganglia structures for OSA syndrome was determined by comparison of the OSA group and control group with surface-based shape analysis.
Results:
Differences in the morphometry of the left thalamus and the left pallidum were found between the OSA group and control group. Compared to the control group, the OSA group presented significant atrophy in the ventral posterior nucleus and the medial dorsal nucleus of the left thalamus, while regional dilation was found in both the internal and external segments of the left pallidum.
Conclusion:
These findings identified the association between the structural deficits of the thalamus and OSA syndrome in children, which was consistent with the existing findings in OSA adults. In addition, the present study provided new insights to the distinctive pattern of structural changes of the pallidum in pediatric OSA when compared to adult OSA.
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