Brain morphology changes after spinal cord injury: A voxel-based meta-analysis

Haiyang Yu; Duanyong Chen; Hai Jiang; Guangtao Fu; Yuhui Yang; Zhantao Deng; Yuanfeng Chen; Qiujian Zheng

doi:10.3389/fneur.2022.999375

Brain morphology changes after spinal cord injury: A voxel-based meta-analysis

Front Neurol. 2022 Sep 1:13:999375. doi: 10.3389/fneur.2022.999375. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Haiyang Yu^{1

2}, Duanyong Chen¹, Hai Jiang¹, Guangtao Fu¹, Yuhui Yang¹, Zhantao Deng¹, Yuanfeng Chen^{1

3}, Qiujian Zheng^{1

4}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Orthopedics, Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital, Guangdong Academy of Medical Sciences, Guangzhou, China.
² Guangdong Cardiovascular Institute, Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital, Guangdong Academy of Medical Sciences, Guangzhou, China.
³ Research Department of Medical Science, Guangdong Provincial People's Hospital, Guangdong Academy of Medical Sciences, Guangzhou, China.
⁴ Department of Orthopedics, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China.

Abstract

Objectives: Spinal cord injury (SCI) remodels the brain structure and alters brain function. To identify specific changes in brain gray matter volume (GMV) and white matter volume (WMV) following SCI, we conducted a voxel-based meta-analysis of whole-brain voxel-based morphometry (VBM) studies.

Methods: We performed a comprehensive literature search on VBM studies that compared SCI patients and healthy controls in PubMed, Web of Science and the China National Knowledge Infrastructure from 1980 to April 2022. Then, we conducted a voxel-based meta-analysis using seed-based d mapping with permutation of subject images (SDM-PSI). Meta-regression analysis was performed to identify the effects of clinical characteristics.

Results: Our study collected 20 studies with 22 GMV datasets and 15 WMV datasets, including 410 patients and 406 healthy controls. Compared with healthy controls, SCI patients showed significant GMV loss in the left insula and bilateral thalamus and significant WMV loss in the bilateral corticospinal tract (CST). Additionally, a higher motor score and pinprick score were positively related to greater GMV in the right postcentral gyrus, whereas a positive relationship was observed between the light touch score and the bilateral postcentral gyrus.

Conclusion: Atrophy in the thalamus and bilateral CST suggest that SCI may trigger neurodegeneration changes in the sensory and motor pathways. Furthermore, atrophy of the left insula may indicate depression and neuropathic pain in SCI patients. These indicators of structural abnormalities could serve as neuroimaging biomarkers for evaluating the prognosis and treatment effect, as well as for monitoring disease progression. The application of neuroimaging biomarkers in the brain for SCI may also lead to personalized treatment strategies.

Systematic review registration: https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42021279716, identifier: CRD42021279716.

Keywords: brain mapping; meta-analysis; neuroimaging; spinal cord injury; voxel-based morphometry.

Publication types

Systematic Review