Carmelina Chiriaco
Italy
Research Article
Superior Cerebellar Peduncle Atrophy Predicts Cognitive Impairment in Relapsing Remitting Multiple Sclerosis Patients with Cerebellar Symptoms: A DTI Study
Author(s): Giuseppe Nicoletti, Paola Valentino, Carmelina Chiriaco, Alfredo Granata, Stefania Barone, Enrica Filippelli, Maria Eugenia Caligiuri, Basilio Vescio, Alessia Sarica and Aldo QuattroneGiuseppe Nicoletti, Paola Valentino, Carmelina Chiriaco, Alfredo Granata, Stefania Barone, Enrica Filippelli, Maria Eugenia Caligiuri, Basilio Vescio, Alessia Sarica and Aldo Quattrone
Background: Using Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI), we tested the hypothesis that cerebellar abnormalities in fractional anisotropy (FA) may be involved in cognitive dysfunctions in Relapsing-Remitting (RR)-Multiple Sclerosis (MS).
Objective: The aim of our study was to investigate the microstructural integrity in MS of regions that connect in both feedforward and feedback pathways to cortical areas, i.e., Superior Cerebellar Peduncles (SCP), Middle Cerebellar Peduncles (MCP), Dentate nuclei (DN) and Thalamus (Th).
Patients and methods: We studied 46 patients with RR-MS (21 with cerebellar signs and 25 without) and 23 normal subjects. All subjects underwent cognitive testing.
Results: In patients with a cerebellar phenotype, cognitive performance in all considered domains was from moderately to s.. View More»