Xueling Suo, Presenter: Nothing to Disclose

Lei Li, Abstract Co-Author: Nothing to Disclose

Du Lei, Abstract Co-Author: Nothing to Disclose

Fuqin Chen, Abstract Co-Author: Nothing to Disclose

Qiyong Gong, Abstract Co-Author: Nothing to Disclose

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a debilitating psychiatric disorder, and children are more vulnerable to developing PTSD after experiencing trauma than adults. Traumatic childhood experience may adversely influence brain development. Recently, graph theoretical approaches have been employed to investigate the aberrant topological organization of brain networks in various neuropsychiatric disorders. To our knowledge, there was no study reporting small-world topology of pediatric PTSD.

We recruited 24 pediatric survivors of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake between 8 and 15 months after the event and 24 age- and sex-matched trauma-exposed non-PTSD controls. The whole-brain functional networks were constructed by thresholding partial correlation matrices of 90 brain regions, and graph theory-based approaches were then performed to investigate their abberant topological properties. Nonparametric permutation tests were further used for group comparisons of topological metrics.

Both the patients and controls showed small-world topology in brain functional networks. However, the patients showed significantly increased in clustering coefficient Cp, local efficiency Eloc and normalized characteristic path length λ . Furthermore, the patients exhibited enhanced nodal centralities in the default-mode network (DMN) including bilateral temporal lobe, and the salience network (SN) including bilateral putamen, pallidum, thalamus and right caudate. The altered nodal centralities in bilateral pallidum were positively correlated with Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale (CAPS).

The pediatric PTSD patients exhibited a tendency toward regular networks characterized by significantly increased local efficiency and decreased global efficiency, and increased nodal centralities in SN and DMN contributing to disruption in cognitive function. Overall, our results demonstrated for the first time that pediatric PTSD is reflected in a disrupted topological organization in large-scale brain functional networks, thus providing valuable information for better understanding the pathogenesis of this disorder.

Aberrant topological organization of brain functional networks may help in diagnosis of pediatric PTSD and decide whether to employ early intervention which may attenuate adverse brain development.

Suo, X, Li, L, Lei, D, Chen, F, Gong, Q, Aberrant Functional Brain Connectome in Pediatric Posttraumatic Stress Disorder.  Radiological Society of North America 2014 Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting, - ,Chicago IL. http://archive.rsna.org/2014/14017287.html