Brain volume in infants with metopic synostosis: Less white matter volume with an accelerated growth pattern in early life

J Anat. 2024 Feb 28. doi: 10.1111/joa.14028. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTMetopic synostosis patients are at risk for neurodevelopmental disorders despite a negligible risk of intracranial hypertension. To gain insight into the underlying pathophysiology of metopic synostosis and associated neurodevelopmental disorders, we aimed to investigate brain volumes of non-syndromic metopic synostosis patients using preoperative MRI brain scans. MRI brain scans were processed with HyperDenseNet to calculate total intracranial volume (TIV), total brain volume (TBV), total grey matter volume (TGMV), total white matter volume (TWMV) and total cerebrospinal fluid volume (TCBFV). We compared global brain volumes of patients with controls corrected for age and sex using linear regression. Lobe-specific grey matter volumes were assessed in secondary analyses. We included 45 metopic synostosis patients and 14 controls (median age at MRI 0.56 years [IQR 0.36] and 1.1 years [IQR 0.47], respectively). We found no significant differences in TIV, TBV, TGMV or TCBFV in patients compared to controls. TWMV was significantly smaller in patients (-62,233 mm3 [95% CI = -96,968; -27,498], Holm-corrected p = 0.004), and raw data show an accelerated growth pattern of white matter in metopic synostosis patients. Grey matter volume analyses per lobe indicated increased cingulate (1378 mm3 [95% CI = 402; 2355]) and temporal grey matter (4747 [95% CI = 178; 9317]) volumes in patients compared to controls. To ...
Source: Journal of Anatomy - Category: Anatomy Authors: Source Type: research