Automatic detection of preclinical neurodegeneration: presymptomatic Huntington disease.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Treatment of neurodegenerative diseases is likely to be most beneficial in the very early, possibly preclinical stages of degeneration. We explored the usefulness of fully automatic structural MRI classification methods for detecting subtle degenerative change. The availability of a definitive genetic test for Huntington disease (HD) provides an excellent metric for judging the performance of such methods in gene mutation carriers who are free of symptoms.

Methods

Using the gray matter segment of MRI scans, this study explored the usefulness of a multivariate support vector machine to automatically identify presymptomatic HD gene mutation carriers (PSCs) in the absence of any a priori information. A multicenter data set of 96 PSCs and 95 age- and sex-matched contr

SUBMITTER: Kloppel S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2817939 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature