Certain Brain Features Linked to Schizophrenia Symptoms

the Psychiatry Advisor take:

Certain features on the brain’s anatomy have been tied to behavioral symptoms associated with schizophrenia.

C. Robert Cloninger, MD, PhD, of the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Mo., and colleagues examined conducted magnetic resonance imaging with diffusion tensor imaging on 47 people with schizophrenia and 36 health controls.

The scans showed that people with schizophrenia tended to have abnormalities in a part of the brain called the corpus callosum, which is considered important for neural communication, the researcher reported in the journal NeuroImage.

Upon further review, it was discovered that charteristics shown in the brain scans matched symptoms of schizophrenia. For example, schizophrenia patients with charateristics in one part of the corpus callosum displayed bizarre and disorganized behavior. Other abnormalities were linked to delusions and hallucinations.

The researchers noted that the results provides further evidence that schizophrenia is a heterogeneous group of disorders rather than a single disorder.

“This gives us a new way of thinking about the disease,” Cloninger said in a statement. “We know that not all patients with schizophrenia have the same issues, and this helps us understand why.”