Altered resting-state cerebellar-cerebral functional connectivity in obsessive-compulsive disorder

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psychiatry
• Medical Imaging

Background:

• The cerebellum's role in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is increasingly recognized.
• Functional connectivity between the cerebellum and cerebral cortex in OCD remains understudied.
• The relationship between cerebellar-cerebral connectivity and OCD clinical symptoms needs further investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate cerebellar-cerebral functional connectivity differences in patients with OCD compared to healthy controls.
• To explore the association between altered functional connectivity and clinical features of OCD.

Main Methods:

• Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was used to scan 27 patients with OCD and 21 healthy controls.
• Seed-based connectivity analyses examined cerebellar-cerebral functional connectivity.
• Statistical analyses correlated functional connectivity with OCD symptom severity and illness duration.

Main Results:

• OCD patients exhibited reduced cerebellar-cerebral functional connectivity in executive control and emotion processing networks compared to controls.
• Decreased connectivity in an executive network (right cerebellar Crus I/inferior parietal lobule) correlated positively with symptom severity.
• Reduced connectivity in an emotion processing network (left cerebellar lobule VI/lingual gyrus) correlated negatively with illness duration.

Conclusions:

• Altered cerebellar-cerebral functional connectivity in cognitive-affective networks is implicated in OCD pathophysiology.
• These findings support the cerebellum's involvement in executive control and emotion regulation deficits observed in OCD.
• The study highlights the cerebellum's contribution to the neurobiological underpinnings of OCD.