[Image processing in psychiatry--a review]

The brain imaging technics computerized tomography (CT), positron emission tomography (PET) and nuclear magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) represent significant tools for a further categorization of psychiatric patients with regard to brain structure and function. Of these technics PET has the unique sensitivity to examine several aspects of brain function as blood flow, metabolic rates and neurotransmitter mechanisms. Since several decades monoaminergic transmitter mechanisms have been implicated in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia and affective disorders as well as in the action of several psychoactive drugs. With regard to schizophrenia and the mechanism of action of antipsychotic drugs Dopamine receptors are in the focus of interest. In order to analyze distribution and binding characteristics of dopamine receptor subtypes in the living brain in relation to neuropsychiatric disorders and antipsychotic drug treatment we developed 11C-Labelled selective ligands binding to dopamine receptor subtypes and used them in vivo PET experiments on human subjects.