Assessment of Maturation and Impairment of the Brain by I-123 Iodoamphetamine SPECT and MR Imaging in Children

抄録

To assess the maturation of the sagittal brain and estimate the prognosis of brain impairment, SPECT after injection of N-isopropyl-p- [I-123] -iodoamphetamine (I-123-IMP) and MR imaging was performed on 40 patients with brain injury at birth or with pediatric brain diseases. The sagittal image patterns of SPECT were compared with the myelination process on MR images. The 40 children were followed neurologically for more than two years after these examinations. The sagittal images of SPECT in 28 normal neurological developed children ranging in age from the neonatal period to 17 years old were classified into eight patterns, and clear increases in regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) correlated with myelination. Four patients with mild brain impairment showed that the developmental pattern was lower than that for the corresponding age of normal neurological developed children. Eight patients with severe brain impairment yielded images that did not correspond to any of the eight patterns, and an increase in rCBF did not correlate with myelination. Our preliminary results may provide useful milestones for estimating the impairment and the prognosis in developing brain using SPECT.