Occipital lobe's cortical thinning in ametropic amblyopia

Background and Purpose: The present study was designed to detect the abnormalities of the cortical thickness in children with ametropic amblyopia by a computer-aided MRI technique. Methods: Nine children with ametropic amblyopia and eight age-matched normal controls underwent MRI brain scanning that was performed on a Siemens Avanto 1.5-T scanner, and standard T-1-weighted high-resolution anatomic scans of magnetization-prepared rapid gradient echo (MPRAGE) sequence were obtained. For the cortical thickness analysis, 3D MPRAGE images were processed with FreeSurfer software package (http://www.nmr.mgh.harvard.edu/freesurfer/), and the cortical thicknesses were compared between the patient group and the normal control group. Results: The cortical thicknesses of the lingual and pericalcarine areas in the left hemisphere and of the cuneus, lateraloccipital and lingual areas in the right hemisphere in the amblyopic group were significantly thinner than those of the control group (P<.05). Conclusion: The changes in cortical thickness of several occipital regions in amblyopic patients may be important in the diagnosis and treatment of this disease. (C) 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.