Movement sequencing abilities and basal ganglia morphology in first-episode schizophrenia

Introduction. Studies of brain morphology suggest a link between movement sequencing ability and basal ganglia dysfunction. Unfortunately, relevant studies have provided inconsistent data, which may be the result of differences in the methods of brain morphology assessment, statistical analysis or h...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The world journal of biological psychiatry 2009, Vol.10 (4_3), p.752-762
Main Authors: Kašpárek, Tomáš, P ikryl, Radovan, Schwarz, Daniel, Tronerová, Sylvie, ešková, Eva, Mikl, Michal, Vaní ek, Ji í
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Acute Disease
Basal ganglia
Basal Ganglia - anatomy & histology
Basal Ganglia - pathology
Female
Humans
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Male
Movement Disorders - diagnosis
Movement Disorders - epidemiology
movement sequencing
schizophrenia
Schizophrenia - diagnosis
Schizophrenia - epidemiology
Severity of Illness Index
voxel-based morphometry
Young Adult
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Summary:Introduction. Studies of brain morphology suggest a link between movement sequencing ability and basal ganglia dysfunction. Unfortunately, relevant studies have provided inconsistent data, which may be the result of differences in the methods of brain morphology assessment, statistical analysis or heterogeneity of the populations studied. Aim. to test the hypothesis of a link between the dysfunction of movement sequencing and basal ganglia morphology in a homogenous sample of first-episode schizophrenia patients. Method. Thirty-seven first-episode schizophrenia patients underwent an assessment of movement sequencing abilities using the NES scale and basal ganglia morphology from MR images. The data were compared with a group of 19 age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Results. The group of first-episode patients had a higher concentration of gray matter than healthy controls in the putamen and pallidum in both hemispheres. Patients with abnormal sequencing of movements had lower gray matter concentration than patients without such abnormalities in the left putamen, and no differences were found between the symptomatic group and healthy controls. Summary and conclusion. Our study suggests the involvement of the left putamen in the movement sequencing abnormalities in schizophrenia. Because of the potential confounding effect of medication, the lack of support from external evidence and the low power to perform the whole-brain analysis the results should be considered as preliminary. Further studies, especially with antipsychotic-naive first-episode schizophrenia patients are needed to solve these issues.
ISSN:1562-2975
1814-1412
DOI:10.1080/15622970701882433