Volume Gain of Brainstem on Medication-Overuse Headache Using Voxel-Based Morphometry

Abstract

Background:Histopathology identified the anatomical and molecular abnormalities of brainstem nuclei in migraine patients. However, the exact whole brainstem structural changes in vivo have not yet been identified in medication-overuse headache (MOH) transformed from migraine. The aim of this study was to investigate the regional volume changes over the whole brainstem in the MOH patients using voxel-based morphometry (VBM) in vivo.Methods:High-resolution three-dimensional structural images were obtained using a 3.0-Tesla magnetic resonance system from 36 MOH patients and 32 normal controls (NCs) who were consecutively recruited from the International Headache Center, Chinese People's Liberation Army General Hospital, from March 2013 to June 2016. VBM was used to assess the brainstem structural alteration in the MOH patients, and voxel-wise correlation was performed to evaluate the relationship with the clinical characteristics.Results:The brainstem region with increased volume located in the left ventrolateral periaqueductal gray (MNI coordinate: -1, -33, -8), ventral tegmental area (MNI coordinate: 0, -22, -12), bilateral substantia nigra (MNI coordinate: -8, -16, -12, 9, -16, -12), and trigeminal root entry zone (MNI coordinate: -19, -29, -31; 19, -32, -29) in MOH patients compared with NCs. The headache visual analog scale score was positively related with the left rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM) (MNI coordinate: -1, -37, -56; cluster size: 20; r = 0.602) in the MOH patients.Conclusions:The regional volume gain of brainstem could underlie the neuromechanism of impaired ascending and descending pathway in the MOH patients, and the left RVM volume alteration could imply the impaired tolerance of nociceptive pain input and could be used to assess the headache disability in the MOH patients.

Examining the Role of the Noradrenergic Locus Coeruleus for Predicting Attention and Brain Maintenance in Healthy Old Age and Disease: An MRI Structural Study for the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative

“…To this end, we adopted a neuroimaging voxel-based morphometry (VBM) approach utilizing 3T T1-weighted structural MRI scans from 686 subjects [ n = 395 (HC), n = 156 (MCI), and 135 (AD)] provided by Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative—ADNI (ADNI2 and ADNI3 phases) [ 62 , 63 ]. Structural volumetric analyses on 3T T1-weighted MRIs with this methodology have been already carried out by several studies showing accurate reliability investigating the integrity of the Brainstem [ 64 , 65 , 66 , 67 ], the LC also in the ADNI [ 68 , 69 , 70 , 71 ] and the other neuromodulators’ seeds such as the Raphe Nuclei [ 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 ], the ventral tegmental area (VTA) [ 76 , 77 , 78 , 79 ] and the nucleus basalis of Meynert (NBM) [ 80 , 81 , 82 , 83 , 84 , 85 , 86 , 87 ]. The main objectives of this study were threefold.…”

Alteration in ventral tegmental area and default mode network interplay and prediction of coma recovery in patients with sTBI

“…Regions of interest (ROIs) were defined using DPABI toolbox. The peak point for the VTA in standardized MNI space were defined according to a procedure previously outlined by Chen et al (MNI coordinate: 0, −22, −12) [ 16 ]. We created a 3-mm sphere at the peak point and applied this for further time-series extraction [ 17 ].…”

Examining the Role of the Noradrenergic Locus Coeruleus for Predicting Attention and Brain Maintenance in Healthy Old Age, Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease: An MRI Structural Study On the Adni Cohort

“…To this end, we adopted a neuroimaging voxel-based morphometry (VBM) approach utilizing 3T T1-weighted structural MRI scans from 686 subjects [n=395 (HC), n=156 (MCI), and 135 (AD)] provided by Alzheimer Disease Neuroimaging Initiative -ADNI (ADNI2 and ADNI3 phases) [49,50]. Structural volumetric analyses on 3T T1-weighted MRIs with this methodology have been already carried out by several studies showing accurate reliability investigating the Brainstem [51,52,53,54], the LC also in the ADNI [55,56,57,58] and the other neuromodulators' seeds such as the Raphe Nuclei [59,60,61,62], the Ventral Tegmental Area [63,64,65,66] and the Nucleus Basalis of Meynert [67,68,69,70,71,72,73,74]. The main objectives of this study were threefold.…”