A quantitative magnetic resonance study of the hippocampus and the temporal horn of the lateral ventricle in healthy subjects

• Published in: The Journal of craniofacial surgery Vol. 24; no. 3; p. 1016
• Main Authors: Zhang, Wenjia, Wang, Xue, Zhou, Zijian, Li, You Qiong
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01.05.2013
• Subjects: Adult; Aged; Female; Hippocampus - anatomy & histology; Humans; Lateral Ventricles - anatomy & histology; Magnetic Resonance Imaging - methods; Male; Middle Aged; Reference Values; Temporal Lobe - anatomy & histology; Young Adult
• ISSN: 1536-3732
• DOI: 10.1097/SCS.0b013e31828b75bd

Hippocampal volume has been measured and used to separate the people who have Alzheimer disease, stress-related psychiatric disorders such as posttraumatic stress disorder, borderline personality disorder, and schizophrenia from normal people. Owing to the long time to measure the volume of the hippocampus and the difficulty to measure temporal horn, we established standard values of the area, width, and height of hippocampus and temporal horn of the lateral ventricle in certain planes in healthy subjects to aid in the clinical diagnosis. We measured the area, height, and width of the hippocampus and the temporal horn of the lateral ventricle and the area of both structures in the planes that are perpendicular to the long axis of the hippocampus on magnetic resonance images in 105 healthy subjects. Measured data of hippocampus and temporal horn are presented as mean ± SD. The results of measurement of hippocampus and temporal horn are provided separately. We obtained the reference range in healthy people, and we found that there is a descending trend in area, width, and height of the hippocampus when the planes were taken from mamillary body to interthalamic adhesion. The difference between the 2 sides shows no significance in terms of areas of hippocampus, P > 0.05. However, width and height of the hippocampus have significant difference between the 2 sides except width measured in the plane passing the interthalamic adhesion, P < 0.01. The effect of sex on the values of measurement cannot be obtained, P < 0.01.