whole-brain voxel-based analysis of structural abnormalities in PTSD: An ENIGMA-PGC study.
See CRZ., Si S., Baird CL., Haswell CC., Hussain A., Olff M., Veltman DJ., Frijling JL., van Zuiden M., Koch SBJ., Nawijn L., Wang L., Zhu Y., Li G., Neria Y., Zhu X., Suarez-Jimenez B., Zilcha-Mano S., Lazarov A., Stevens JS., Ressler K., Fani N., Jovanovic T., van Rooij SJH., Kaufman ML., Lebois LAM., Rosso IM., Olson EA., Baker JT., Sponheim SR., Disner SG., Davenport ND., Etkin A., Maron-Katz A., Stein MB., Shenton ME., Stein DJ., Ipser J., Koopowitz S-M., Seedat S., du Plessis S., van den Heuvel LL., Lissek S., Berg H., Straube T., Hofman D., Baugh LA., Forster GL., Simons RM., Simons JS., Magnotta VA., Fercho KA., Wang X., Cotton AS., O'Leary EN., Xie H., Grupe DW., Nitschke JB., Davidson RJ., Larson CL., deRoon-Cassini TA., Tomas CW., Fitzgerald JM., Blackford JU., Olatunji BO., Gordon EM., May G., Nelson SM., Lanius R., Théberge J., Densmore M., Neufeld RWJ., Abdallah CG., Averill CL., Harpaz-Rotem I., Levy I., Krystal JH., Geuze E., van Lutterveld R., Dennis EL., Tate DF., Cifu DX., Walker WC., Wilde EA., van der Wee NJA., Vermeiren RRJM., van der Werff SJA., McLaughlin K., Sambrook K., Peverill M., Radua J., Salminen LE., Jahanshad N., Thomopoulos SI., James A., Valmaggia L., Thompson PM., Morey RA., Kempton MJ.
BACKGROUND: Patients with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) exhibit smaller regional brain volumes in commonly reported regions including the amygdala and hippocampus, regions associated with fear and memory processing. In the current study, we have conducted a voxel-based morphometry (VBM) meta-analysis using whole-brain statistical maps with neuroimaging data from the ENIGMA-PGC PTSD working group. METHODS: T1-weighted structural neuroimaging scans from 36 cohorts (PTSD n = 1309; controls n = 2198) were processed using a standardized VBM pipeline (ENIGMA-VBM tool). We meta-analyzed the resulting statistical maps for voxel-wise differences in gray matter (GM) and white matter (WM) volumes between PTSD patients and controls, performed subgroup analyses considering the trauma exposure of the controls, and examined associations between regional brain volumes and clinical variables including PTSD (CAPS-4/5, PCL-5) and depression severity (BDI-II, PHQ-9). RESULTS: PTSD patients exhibited smaller GM volumes across the frontal and temporal lobes, and cerebellum, with the most significant effect in the left cerebellum (Hedges' g = 0.22, pcorrected = .001), and smaller cerebellar WM volume (peak Hedges' g = 0.14, pcorrected = .008). We observed similar regional differences when comparing patients to trauma-exposed controls, suggesting these structural abnormalities may be specific to PTSD. Regression analyses revealed PTSD severity was negatively associated with GM volumes within the cerebellum (p corrected = .003), while depression severity was negatively associated with GM volumes within the cerebellum and superior frontal gyrus in patients (p corrected = .001). CONCLUSIONS: PTSD patients exhibited widespread, regional differences in brain volumes where greater regional deficits appeared to reflect more severe symptoms. Our findings add to the growing literature implicating the cerebellum in PTSD psychopathology.