Effects of hypertension on subcortical nucleus morphological alternations in patients with type 2 diabetes

Feng Cui; Zhi-Qiang Ouyang; Yi-Zhen Zeng; Bing-Bing Ling; Li Shi; Yun Zhu; He-Yi Gu; Wan-Lin Jiang; Ting Zhou; Xue-Jin Sun; Dan Han; Yi Lu

doi:10.3389/fendo.2023.1201281

Effects of hypertension on subcortical nucleus morphological alternations in patients with type 2 diabetes

Front Endocrinol (Lausanne). 2023 Sep 13:14:1201281. doi: 10.3389/fendo.2023.1201281. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Feng Cui¹, Zhi-Qiang Ouyang¹, Yi-Zhen Zeng¹, Bing-Bing Ling¹, Li Shi², Yun Zhu¹, He-Yi Gu¹, Wan-Lin Jiang¹, Ting Zhou¹, Xue-Jin Sun¹, Dan Han¹, Yi Lu¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Medical Imaging, Laboratory of Brain Function, First Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan, China.
² Department of Endocrinology, First Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University, Kunming, Yunnan, China.

Abstract

Objectives: Type 2 diabetes mellitus(T2DM) and hypertension(HTN) are common comorbidities, and known to affect the brain. However, little is known about the effects of the coexisting HTN on brain in T2DM patients. So we aim to investigate the impact of HTN on the subcortical nucleus morphological alternations in T2DM patients.

Materials & methods: This work was registered by the clinicaltrials.gov (grant number NCT03564431). We recruited a total of 92 participants, comprising 36 only T2DM patients, 28 T2DM patients with HTN(T2DMH) and 28 healthy controls(HCs) in our study. All clinical indicators were assessed and brain image data was collected for each participant. Voxel-based morphometry(VBM), automatic volume and vertex-based shape analyses were used to determine the subcortical nucleus alternations from each participant's 3D-T1 brain images and evaluate the relationship between the alternations and clinical indicators.

Results: T2DMH patients exhibited volumetric reduction and morphological alterations in thalamus compared to T2DM patients, whereas T2DM patients did not demonstrate any significant subcortical alterations compared to HCs. Furthermore, negative correlations have been found between thalamic alternations and the duration of HTN in T2DMH patients.

Conclusion: Our results revealed that HTN may exacerbate subcortical nucleus alternations in T2DM patients, which highlighted the importance of HTN management in T2DM patients to prevent further damage to the brain health.

Keywords: hypertension; shape analysis; subcortical nucleus; type 2 diabetes mellitus; volume analysis.

Publication types

Clinical Study
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Brain
Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2* / complications
Head
Humans
Hypertension* / complications
Imaging, Three-Dimensional

Associated data

ClinicalTrials.gov/NCT03564431

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Nature Science Foundation of China (grant number 82160164) Yunnan Provincial Science and Technology Department & Kunming Medical University applied basic research (grant number 202201AY070001-069) and Doctoral Scientific Foundation of the First Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University (grant number 2018BS019).