Zhongguo quanke yixue (Aug 2022)
Amide Proton Transfer-weighted Imaging of Patients with Alzheimer's Disease
Abstract
Background Alzheimer's disease (AD) prevalence is increasing as aging advances worldwide, but its diagnosis is difficult due to atypical early clinical symptoms. Therefore, exploring new and reliable imaging techniques to improve early diagnosis rate of AD has become an important challenge in medical research. Objective To assess the correlation of amide proton content in brain with clinical symptoms of AD. Methods 41 AD patients over 55 years old in Affiliated Psychological Hospital of Anhui Medical University were enrolled from November 2019 to August 2021, and 37 healthy volunteers were recruited at the same time. The Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Behavioral Pathology in Alzheimer's Disease Rating Scale (BEHAVE-AD) were used to evaluate the cognitive function, and behavioral symptoms, respectively. APTw MRI was used to take cephalograms. Spearman rank correlation analysis was used to explore the relationship between content of brain amide protons and psychiatric symptom factors in AD patients. Results (1) The results showed that the MMSE and BEHAVE-AD scores were significantly different between AD patients and healthy controls (P<0.05) . AD patients had significantly increased contents of amide protons in the right, left, and total hippocampus under 2 ut, and in the right, left and total hippocampus under 4 ut, than did healthy controls (P<0.05) . But the contents of amide protons in the left and total hippocampus under 3 ut in AD patients were lower than those in healthy controls (P<0.05) . (2) Spearman rank correlation analysis showed that the content of amide protons in the right hippocampus under 2 ut was positively correlated with the scores of delusional ideation factor (rs=0.574, P=0.040) and hallucinations factor (rs=0.595, P=0.032) and diurnal rhythm disturbances factor (rs=0.591, P=0.033) . Under 3 ut, the content of amide protons in the right hippocampus was positively correlated with the scores of delusional ideation factor (rs=0.588, P=0.034) and hallucinations factor (rs=0.572, P=0.041) and diurnal rhythm disturbances factor (rs=0.650, P=0.016) , whereas content of amide protons in the left hippocampus was negatively correlated with the score of spatial orientation (rs=-0.590, P=0.034) . The amide proton content in the total hippocampus under 3 ut was positively correlated with scores of delusional ideation factor (rs=0.625, P=0.022) and hallucinations factor (rs=0.606, P=0.028) and diurnal rhythm disturbances factor (rs=0.611, P=0.026) . Under 4 ut, the content of amide protons in the right hippocampus was positively correlated with the score of emotion factor (rs=0.615, P=0.025) , whereas content of amide proton in the left hippocampus was negatively correlated with scores of temporal orientation (rs=-0.570, P=0.042) , attention (rs=-0.570, P=0.042) , and remote memory (rs=-0.732, P=0.004) . The amide proton content in the total hippocampus under 4 ut was positively correlated with score of emotion factor (rs=0.580, P=0.038) . Conclusion We found that there were abnormal changes in the content of amide protons in the hippocampus of AD patients, which may be related to the patients' cognitive fuction and psychotic symptoms. This study may provide a new idea for clinical diagnosis of AD.
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