Elsevier

Neuroscience Letters

Volume 480, Issue 1, 9 August 2010, Pages 30-34
Neuroscience Letters

Brain volume alteration and the correlations with the clinical characteristics in drug-naïve first-episode MDD patients: A voxel-based morphometry study

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neulet.2010.05.075Get rights and content

Abstract

Structural brain abnormalities have been widely reported in major depressive disorder (MDD). However, many previous results cannot exclude the interferences of medication or multiple recurrent episodes. In this study, we examined structural brain abnormalities by comparing 68 drug-naïve first-episode adult-onset MDD and 68 healthy controls (HCs). Structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and voxel-based morphometry (VBM) methods were used. The mean values of grey matter volume/white matter volume (GMV/WMV) were calculated, then the differences between MDD and HCs were analyzed, and the associations of the differences with clinical characteristics of depression were discussed. The whole brain GMV/WMV did not differ between MDD patients and HCs; however, the regional GMV of the right pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA) was smaller in MDD patients. The GMV of both hippocampi was positively correlated with symptom severity and lower in patients with long durations. These results indicate the GMV reduction of the pre-SMA at an early stage of depression, whereas the GMV of the hippocampus is associated with depressive characteristics. Moreover, the whole brain GMV/WMV was negatively related to the duration of depression, supporting that volume loss could become progressive during the development of disease. These results may suggest the importance of identifying and intervening depression at an early stage, especially the first year after onset, to prevent volume loss in the brain.

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Acknowledgments

This work is supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (30530250 and 30500150), Science and Technology Foundation of Yunnan Province (2006PT08), 973 Program from the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (2006CB500808, 2009CB941300, 2007CB512303 and 2009CB522006), United Funding of Yunnan Provincial Science and Technology Department and Kunming Medical College (2008C0005R), and Funding of Health Science and Technology Plan of Yunnan Province (2009NS092).

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