Research ReportA Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study of the Cerebellar Vermis in Chronically Treated and Treatment-Naïve Children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Combined Type
Section snippets
Methods and Materials
All subjects (N = 47) were right-handed and consisted of 15 girls and 32 boys with a mean age of (11.34 ± 2.42 years). There were three groups: ADHD-C children with no history of stimulant medication treatment (n = 14), ADHD-C children chronically treated with stimulant medication (n = 18), and typically developing control children (n = 15). Chronically treated children with ADHD-C had taken medication for at least 1 year (range of 2.3–5 years). The treatment-naïve ADHD-C group had never
Results
Initial analysis of Conners' Global Index RI indicated, as expected, group differences in both ADHD groups versus control subjects (F = 7.648, df = 2, 43, p = .001) but no differences between the ADHD groups (p = .742). This suggests that the ADHD groups did not differ on the level of symptom severity. Demographic and clinical variables are presented in Table 1.
Discussion
As hypothesized, treatment-naïve children with ADHD had significantly smaller area measures in the posterior inferior vermis (lobules VIII–X) than either the chronically treated children with ADHD or control subjects. No differences were observed between chronically treated and typically developing control subjects in any vermal area measurement. This finding is important given recent accounts of cerebellar abnormalities in children with ADHD.
Numerous studies have reported that children with
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2019, Journal of Affective DisordersCitation Excerpt :However, according to previous studies, patients with ADHD presenting with comorbidities, such as oppositional defiant disorder, simple phobia and dysthymic disorder, show a different cortical morphometry than patients with ADHD without comorbidities (Wolosin et al., 2009). In addition, compared to non-medicated patients with ADHD, medicated patients with ADHD have more normal volumes and/or morphology in ADHD-relevant brain regions, including the anterior cingulate cortex (Semrud-Clikeman et al., 2006), cerebellum (Bledsoe et al., 2009), and basal ganglia (Sobel et al., 2010). Finally, ADHD is diagnosed more frequently in males than in females (2–4 to 1), and evidence suggests that there are different underlying neuropathophysiological processes between boys and girls with ADHD (Davies, 2014; Qiu et al., 2009).