Smaller head of the hippocampus in Gulf War-related posttraumatic stress disorder

Structural magnetic ressonance imaging in anxiety disorders: an update of research findings

“…81 In this updated review of morphometric MRI studies of anxiety disorders, we have once again verified that PTSD remains as the anxiety disorder most extensively investigated by structural neuroimaging over the last five years. In agreement with our previous review, 10 the main morphological feature detected in this disorder is a reduction of the hippocampus, [22][23][24][25][26][27] although with some degree of disagreement among studies regarding laterality and even the presence of changes.…”

“…[22][23][24][25][26][27] However, as shown in our previous review, 10 there is also some disagreement about laterality 21,[28][29][30] and even about the presence of this reduction, 13,[31][32][33][34] in both ROI and VBM-based studies. These contrasting findings, in addition to being due to possible neurobiological abnormalities, may also be due to methodological limitations such as differences in the selection of the hippocampus by manual methods.…”

Hippocampal volume and declarative memory function in combat-related PTSD

“…Of the 9 studies testing declarative memory, 2 did not report whether group differences were found, and only 4 reported signifi cantly worse memory in PTSD. Hence, notwithstanding the power of the SDAT example, a strong test of its applicability to PTSD rests on only four studies (Bremner et al, 1995(Bremner et al, , 1997Nakano et al, 2002 ;Vythilingam et al, 2005 ). Of those four, two reported the expected correlations (Bremner et al, 1995 ;Vythilingam et al, 2005 ), and two did not, a chance rate.…”

“…Hence, notwithstanding the power of the SDAT example, a strong test of its applicability to PTSD rests on only four studies (Bremner et al, 1995(Bremner et al, , 1997Nakano et al, 2002 ;Vythilingam et al, 2005 ). Of those four, two reported the expected correlations (Bremner et al, 1995 ;Vythilingam et al, 2005 ), and two did not, a chance rate. Among studies that have reported signifi cant PTSD effects on hippocampal volume or declarative memory (but not both) and also tested structural-functional correlations, one reported positive fi ndings (Tischler et al, 2006 ;Yehuda et al, 2007 ; these publications report on the same sample) and two had negative fi ndings (Gurvits et al, 1996 ;Stein, Koverola, Hanna, Torchia, & McClarty, 1997 ).…”

Abnormal Brain Density in Victims of Rape with PTSD in Mainland China: A Voxel-Based Analysis of Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study

“…However, the results have been inconsistent, with studies reporting significant reductions or increases, as well as unchanged volumes. For example, studies have shown that patients with PTSD are associated with bilateral lower hippocampal volume (Bossini & Castrogiovanni, 2007;Bremner et al, 2003;Emdad et al, 2006;Lindauer et al, 2004a;Vythilingam et al, 2005;Li et al, 2006), which are www.intechopen.com considered to be either due to atrophy of the hippocampus as a consequence of suffering from PTSD due to excessive stress (Bremner et al, 1995;Gurvits et al, 1996) or that hippocampal volume to be a risk factor for developing PTSD (Gilbertson et al, 2002). Other studies report unchanged hippocampal volumes in female patients with chronic PTSD traumatized by intimate partner violence (Fennema-Notestine et al, 2002), those traumatized by witnessing a plane crash at the same air show (Jatzko et al, 2006a), elderly PTSD patients (Golier et al, 2006), and adult burn patients (Winter & Irle, 2004).…”