White Matter Integrity in Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease: A Diffusion-Tensor Imaging Study

Abstract

‘Mild Cognitive Impairment’ (MCI) describes patients with cognitive problems, who don’t qualify for a diagnosis of dementia. Tract-Based Spatial Statistics (TBSS) is a fully automated whole brain analysis technique for diffusion-tensor imaging that projects all subjects' FA data onto a mean FA tract skeleton, before applying voxel-wise cross-subject statistics. Patients with Alzheimer’s and MCI were compared with healthy controls using TBSS to investigate the effect of MCI on white matter integrity. Global FA was decreased in AD and MCI. The spatial distribution of changes in MCI paralleled those in AD. DTI may become useful in the early diagnosis of MCI.