Serafini G, Gonda X, Rihmer Z, Girardi P, Amore M. White matter abnormalities: Insights into the pathophysiology of major affective disorders. World J Radiol 2014; 6(6): 223-229 [PMID: 24976925 DOI: 10.4329/wjr.v6.i6.223]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Gianluca Serafini, MD, PhD, Department of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Sensory Organs, Suicide Prevention Center, Sant’Andrea Hospital, Sapienza University of Rome, 1035-1039, Via di Grottarossa, 00189 Rome, Italy. gianluca.serafini@uniroma1.it
Research Domain of This Article
Psychiatry
Article-Type of This Article
Frontier
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Radiol. Jun 28, 2014; 6(6): 223-229 Published online Jun 28, 2014. doi: 10.4329/wjr.v6.i6.223
White matter abnormalities: Insights into the pathophysiology of major affective disorders
Gianluca Serafini, Xenia Gonda, Zoltan Rihmer, Paolo Girardi, Mario Amore
Gianluca Serafini, Paolo Girardi, Department of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Sensory Organs, Suicide Prevention Center, Sant’Andrea Hospital, Sapienza University of Rome, 00189 Rome, Italy
Xenia Gonda, Zoltan Rihmer, Department of Clinical and Theoretical Mental Health, Kutvolgyi Clinical Center, 1125 Budapest, Hungary
Mario Amore, Department of Neuroscience, Rehabilitation, Ophthalmology, Genetics, Maternal and Child Health, Section of Psychiatry, University of Genova, I-16146 Genova, Italy
Author contributions: Serafini G designed the study and wrote the manuscript; Amore M, Girardi P and Rihmer Z provided the intellectual impetuous and supervised the search strategy; Gonda X contributed in reviewing the literature and provided help in selecting papers in the present manuscript.
Correspondence to: Gianluca Serafini, MD, PhD, Department of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Sensory Organs, Suicide Prevention Center, Sant’Andrea Hospital, Sapienza University of Rome, 1035-1039, Via di Grottarossa, 00189 Rome, Italy. gianluca.serafini@uniroma1.it
Telephone: +39-06-33775675 Fax: +39-06-33775342
Received: January 23, 2014 Revised: April 13, 2014 Accepted: May 16, 2014 Published online: June 28, 2014
Core Tip
Core tip: Understanding neural correlates underlying psychiatric morbidity over time is critical but, to date, structural magnetic resonance imaging studies identified only not stable risk predictors of unfavourable outcome in psychiatric populations. The presence of white matter hyperintensities (WMHs) has been commonly associated with a poor outcome in individuals with major affective disorders. Based on our studies, subjects with WMHs may be considered at higher suicidal risk than those without and the severity of WMHs as assessed by the Fazekas modified scale may serve as a trait marker of disease. WMHs may represent an interesting neurobiological marker between the underlying vulnerability and clinical presentation of major affective disorders.
