Changes of brain gray matter volume in patients with somatoform pain disorder and the relationship with NRS score
MAO Chunping
HUANG Jinbai
YANG Tao
Abstract：Objective Using voxel-based morphometry (VBM) to investigate the changes of brain gray matter (GM) volume in patients with somatoform pain disorder (SPD) and to explore its relationship with the degree of pain.Methods A total of 10 SPD patients and 14 healthy volunteers were enrolled in this study.The SPD patients were evaluated by the numerical rating scale (NRS).The SPD patients and healthy volunteers were both examined by head magnetic resonance imaging (MRI),and 3D T1WI high resolution data were acquired.The whole brain volume and gray matter volume were calculated and the meaningful GM regions of SPD patients were obtained by VBM.The correlation between the GM volume and the NRS scores in SPD patients was analyzed by Pearson analysis.Results VBM showed that the gray matter volume in the SPD group was larger than that in the control group (P<0.01),and the regions of increased gray matter volume was mainly located in the left thalamus.There was no significant correlation between the left thalamus gray matter volume and the NRS score in the SPD group (r=0.631,P>0.05).Conclusions The head MRI VBM shows brain gray matter volume increases in SPD patients,and it is mainly located in the left thalamus.There is no significant correlation between the changes of brain gray matter volume and the degree of pain.
Keywords：somatoform pain disordermagnetic resonance imagingvoxel-based morphometrybrain gray matter volume
Publication Date：2017-01-01
Online Publishing Date：2025-08-15(First online date of this platform, not the publication date of the document)
Pages：4( 5-8 )