Comparing thalamic volumes between focal cortical dysplasia patients and healthy individuals

Focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) is a congenital deformity caused by FCD maturation, differentiation, and neuronal migration. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is one of the most popular and consistent procedures for diagnosing FCD. Limited research has evaluated the relationship between the FCD and thalamic volume. Therefore, we conducted the current study to compare thalamic volumes between patients with FCD and healthy individuals.

The current study was a cross-sectional study of patients with FCD referred to Kashani and Milad Hospitals in Isfahan City in 2019-2021. All patients who met the inclusion criteria were enrolled in the study using the census method. The study population was divided into two groups: patients with FCD and healthy controls. MRI was performed on patients with FCD using a Siemens 1.5 or 3 Tesla MRI device. The data were analyzed using SPSS Statistics for Windows (IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 18.0).

Among the 60 patients, 30 had FCD with a mean age of 22.6 ± 9.3 years, and 30 were healthy with a mean age of 26.3 ± 3.6 years. The only significant difference observed was between the right and left thalamic volumes in the FCD group (P = 0.042). The thalamus on the involved side was significantly smaller than that on the non-involved side in patients (P-value < 0.001). However, no significant differences were observed in the absolute value of the difference between the left and right thalamic volumes when comparing all patients with FCD to those in the non-FCD group (P = 0.054).

Our study showed that in patients with FCD, the thalamus on the involved side was significantly smaller than that on the noninvolved side.