背景:早泄(PE),男性常见的性功能障碍,经常伴随着异常的心理因素,比如抑郁症。最近的神经影像学研究揭示了PE患者的脑结构和功能异常。然而,支持PE和抑郁症共病的神经学证据有限.本研究旨在探讨PE伴抑郁症患者脑功能网络的拓扑变化。
方法:从60例PE患者(30例有抑郁症,30例无抑郁症)和29例健康对照(HC)获得静息状态功能磁共振成像(rs-fMRI)数据。基于rs-fMRI数据为所有参与者构建了功能性脑网络。通过图论分析方法计算节点中心性和效率等节点参数,并进行组间比较。此外,结果通过家庭误差(FWE)进行多重比较得到校正(p<.05).
结果:患有抑郁症的PE患者在右苍白球中的程度中心性和整体效率增加,与HCs相比,右丘脑的度数中心性增加。没有抑郁的PE患者在右苍白球和丘脑中显示出程度中心性增加,以及在正确的precuneus提高全球效率,苍白球,和丘脑与HCs相比。伴有抑郁症的PE患者在右侧苍白球和丘脑中的中心性降低,以及右前叶的全球效率下降,苍白球,与没有抑郁症的人相比,还有丘脑。上面的所有大脑区域都在FWE校正中幸存下来。
结论:结果表明,功能连接增加和减少,以及大脑中信息的全球整合能力,可能与PE患者并发抑郁的发生有关,分别。这些发现为理解PE和抑郁症患者的病理机制提供了新的见解。
BACKGROUND: Premature ejaculation (PE), a common male sexual dysfunction, often accompanies by abnormal psychological factors, such as depression. Recent neuroimaging studies have revealed structural and functional brain abnormalities in PE patients. However, there is limited neurological evidence supporting the comorbidity of PE and depression. This study aimed to explore the topological changes of the functional brain networks of PE patients with depression.
METHODS: Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) data were acquired from 60 PE patients (30 with depression and 30 without depression) and 29 healthy controls (HCs). Functional brain networks were constructed for all participants based on rs-fMRI data. The nodal parameters including nodal centrality and efficiency were calculated by the method of graph theory analysis and then compared between groups. In addition, the results were corrected for multiple comparisons by family-wise error (FWE) (p < .05).
RESULTS: PE patients with depression had increased degree centrality and global efficiency in the right pallidum, as well as increased degree centrality in the right thalamus when compared with HCs. PE patients without depression showed increased degree centrality in the right pallidum and thalamus, as well as increased global efficiency in the right precuneus, pallidum, and thalamus when compared with HCs. PE patients with depression demonstrated decreased degree centrality in the right pallidum and thalamus, as well as decreased global efficiency in the right precuneus, pallidum, and thalamus when compared to those without depression. All the brain regions above survived the FWE correction.
CONCLUSIONS: The results suggested that increased and decreased functional connectivity, as well as the capability of global integration of information in the brain, might be related to the occurrence of PE and the comorbidity depression in PE patients, respectively. These findings provided new insights into the understanding of the pathological mechanisms underlying PE and those with depression.