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Longitudinal follow-up of individual white matter hyperintensities in a large cohort of elderly

  • Diagnostic Neuroradiology
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Abstract

Introduction

We report on a method for the longitudinal follow-up of individual white matter hypersignals (WMH) and on its application to the study of WMH natural evolution in a cohort of 1,118 elderly over a 4-year period.

Materials and methods

For each subject, automated WMH detection was performed on T2-weighted MR images acquired both at baseline and at follow-up after registration in a common space. The detection algorithm was designed both to track WMH previously existing at baseline and to identify newly formed WMH.

Results

The average annual change in WMH load was found to be 0.25 cm3/year, 36% of this change being attributable to newly formed WMH. Quantitative analyses showed that change in WMH was mainly explained by progression of juxtaventricular and periventricular WMH while the load of WMH in the deep white matter zones was found stable over 4 years of the study. Statistical parametric mapping confirmed these spatial WMH change distributions in the juxta- and periventricular zones. High blood pressure was not a significant predictor of the annual change in WMH.

Conclusion

This study proposes a new scheme for the longitudinal study of WMH change by dissociating worsening of existent WMH from surfacing of new WMH and may thus contribute to help understanding and characterizing the neurological and etiological bases of these two processes and their potential differences.

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Acknowledgments

P. Maillard has been supported by a grant from the Ministère de l’Enseignement Supérieur et de la Recherche. The authors are indebted to P. Karamian, P. Guillon, V. Besançon, O. Coskun, and S. Bricogne for early contributions to this work. This study has been conducted within the framework of the ICBM project (http://www.loni.ucla.edu/ICBM/).The Three-City Study is conducted under a partnership agreement between the Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM), the Victor Segalen-Bordeaux II University, and Sanofi-Aventis. The Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale funded the preparation and initiation of the study. The 3C Study is also supported by the Caisse Nationale Maladie des Travailleurs Salariés, Direction Générale de la Santé, MGEN, Institut de la Longévité, Conseils Régionaux of Aquitaine and Bourgogne, Fondation de France, and Ministry of Research-INSERM Programme “Cohortes et collections de données biologiques.”

Conflict of interest statement

We declare that we have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre d’Imagerie-Neurosciences et Applications aux Pathologies, CI-NAPS, UMR6232, CNRS, CEA, Université de Caen, Université Paris Descartes, GIP Cyceron, BP5229, 14074, Caen cedex, France

    Pauline Maillard, Fabrice Crivello, Nathalie Tzourio-Mazoyer & Bernard Mazoyer

  2. Neuroépidémiologie U708, INSERM, Paris, France

    Carole Dufouil & Christophe Tzourio

  3. Institut Universitaire de France, Paris, France

    Bernard Mazoyer

  4. GIP cyceron, CHU, Caen, France

    Bernard Mazoyer

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  1. Pauline Maillard
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  6. Bernard Mazoyer
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Correspondence to Bernard Mazoyer.

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Maillard, P., Crivello, F., Dufouil, C. et al. Longitudinal follow-up of individual white matter hyperintensities in a large cohort of elderly. Neuroradiology 51, 209–220 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00234-008-0489-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00234-008-0489-0

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