Resting state functional brain imaging in obsessive-compulsive disorder across genders

Abstract

Objectives

Epidemiological and clinical gender differences in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) have been reported; however, gender differences in brain functional connectivity and the relationship between resting brain functional imaging and clinical symptoms has not been studied in OCD.

Methods

A total of 62 drug-naive patients with OCD (31 males, 31 females) and 60 healthy controls (HCs) (30 males, 30 females) matched for age, sex, and education underwent magnetic resonance imaging. Amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) over the whole brain and seed-based connectivity analyses were evaluated to examine the intrinsic cerebral activity of the subjects. Additionally, associations between functional connectivity and clinical features were analysed.

Results

Compared to male OCD (mOCD) patients, female OCD (fOCD) patients showed higher ALFF values in the right parahippocampal gyrus. Compared to HCs, fOCD patients showed significantly decreased functional connectivity between the right parahippocampal gyrus and whole brain to the right posterior central gyrus/precentral gyrus/superior temporal gyrus/barycentric lobule and left anterior cuneus. Abnormal functional connectivity was negatively correlated with the Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale, Beck Depression Inventory-II, and Beck Anxiety Inventory total scores.

Conclusions

Our results suggest that the right parahippocampal gyrus, which is related to executive control and emotional regulation, may show gender differences in OCD.

Keywords:

• Obsessive-compulsive disorder
• functional connectivity
• low-frequency fluctuation
• gender

Acknowledgments

None.

Ethical standards

The authors declare that all procedures contributing to this work comply with the ethical standards of the relevant national and institutional committees on human experimentation and are in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2008.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation of China (82071518) and the grants from Shanghai Municipal Health Commission (2019ZB0201, 20204Y0364) and Shanghai Mental Health Center (2020-YJ14).