European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience最新文献

Introduction: Language impairment has the potential to predict the onset and progression of psychosis. However, it was mainly examined using automated extraction of quantitative linguistic features and their associations with observable psychopathological aspects of psychosis (e.g., formal thought disorders). Little interest has been paid to subjective language disturbances that should phenomenologically anticipate these more objective clinical features. Therefore, the aim of this examination was to investigate subjective language disorders in a Ultra-High Risk (UHR) sample and their associations with clinical and functional outcomes along 2 years of follow-up.

Methods: 170 UHR participants (88 [51.8%] females; mean age = 19.52 ± 6.03 years) were assessed for a broad range of clinical outcomes, including psychosis transition, clinical and functional remission measured with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale and the Social and Occupational Functioning Assessment Scale. Comparisons between patients with or without baseline subjective language disorders (specifically explored with the Schizophrenia Proneness Instrument) were analyzed using Chi-Square and Mann-Whitney tests, Kaplan-Meier survival analysis, and binary logistic regression analysis.

Results: Across the follow-up, the UHR subgroup with language disorders at entry (n = 80) showed higher and more enduring severity in psychopathology (especially negative and disorganized features), as well as poorer socio-occupational functioning over time.

Conclusion: The presence of subjective language disturbances at baseline identifies a subgroup of UHR youths with poorer psychopathological and functional prognosis. Further studies examining their association with quantitative linguistic biomarkers are needed, especially to better predict the onset and progression of psychosis.

People living with schizophrenia (PLWS) have a reduced life expectancy with cardiovascular disease (CVD) as a major contributor. This article reviews the existing populations and animal studies and summarizes that reduced abundance of Lachnospiraceae, Bacteroides, Faecalibacterium, Ruminococcus, Roseburia, Bifidobacterium, Lactobacillus, Akkermansia, Rikenellaceae and increased abundance of Prevotella, Clostridium, Escherichia in PLWS is one of the probable reasons for the increased risk of CVD prevalence in PLWS by affecting the metabolism of substances related to the development of Schizophrenia (SCZ) and CVD.

Background: Schizophrenia is marked by disruptions in functional connectivity; however, findings on the specific brain regions involved and the direction of connectivity changes remain inconsistent. Therefore, a more comprehensive framework that evaluates whole-brain functional connectivity is needed to better understand brain dysfunction and its relationship to symptoms. This study aims to investigate whether the primary gradient in schizophrenia patients differs significantly from that in healthy controls using recently developed gradient-based analysis.

Methods: We applied a gradient analysis to resting-state fMRI data to characterize the sensorimotor-to-transmodal functional cortical organization in schizophrenia patients (n = 32) and healthy controls (n = 27). We also used correlation analysis to examine the relationship between primary gradient organization and PANSS positive, negative, general subscale scores and total scores of SANS in schizophrenia patients.

Results: The gradient analysis demonstrated that, compared with the healthy controls, schizophrenia exhibited reduced sensorimotor-to-transmodal differentiation in which there is increased gradient values from the sensorimotor systems of the cortical organizations such as visual network and decreased gradient values from the higher-level systems such as salience network and frontoparietal network. Alterations in primary gradient organization were significantly associated with PANSS positive and negative subscales, and total scores of SANS in schizophrenia.

Conclusion: The results indicate that schizophrenia exhibits disrupted cortical functional organization, and this arises from the reduced differentiation within the sensorimotor-to-transmodal gradient. These alterations in the sensorimotor-to-transmodal gradient explains variability in some of the clinical symptoms of schizophrenia.

Aberrant sensori-/psychomotor functioning-including muscular hand weakness, sedentary behavior, psychomotor agitation, slowing, agitation, apathy, and anxiety-is increasingly recognized as a transdiagnostic feature across mental and neurodegenerative disorders. Objectively measured sensori-/psychomotor abnormalities serve as rapid, noninvasive indicators of cognitive and affective dysfunction, yet large-scale neuroimaging studies examining their white matter (WM) correlates remain limited. This bi-centric research project aims to investigate associations between sensori-/psychomotor functioning and WM microstructure across anxiety disorders (AD), major depressive disorder (MDD), schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSD), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and Alzheimer's disease (AD). We will analyze diffusion MRI data from over 2,400 healthy individuals and 1,600 patients, combining publicly available datasets (e.g., Human Connectome Project, Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative) with in-house cohorts comprising >400 deeply-phenotyped SSD and MDD patients. A major strength of the project lies in the harmonization of psychopathological rating scales and sensori-/psychomotor assessments across these populations. Using advanced computational tools-including tractometry, tractomics, normative modeling, and deep learning-we aim to map a WM phenotype of sensori-/psychomotor dysfunction across the lifespan. Multivariate taxometric approaches will help identify biologically informed sensori-/psychomotor biotypes that cut across traditional diagnostic boundaries. By distinguishing disorder-specific WM changes from normative developmental and aging processes, this project seeks to inform precision medicine approaches and guide biomarker-driven interventions for mental and neurodegenerative disorders.

Cannabis use is highly prevalent in individuals with psychosis, raising concerns about its influence on brain function. Electroencephalography (EEG) studies have identified alterations in brain activity in psychosis, including changes in spectral entropy (SE) modulation and connectivity strength (CS). However, the degree to which cannabis use contributes to these alterations remains unclear. This study investigated the effects of recent cannabis use on specific EEG measures previously found to be altered in psychosis: (i) SE modulation, (ii) pre-stimulus theta and broadband CS, and (iii) baseline CS in the gamma band. We focused specifically on the immediate effects of recent cannabis use, without considering factors like tetrahydrocannabinol content, frequency of use, or age of onset. We included 93 patients with psychosis (32 recent cannabis users, 61 non-users) and 86 age- and sex-matched healthy controls (HC; all non-users). Recent cannabis use was defined as any consumption within the past week, assessed through a clinical interview and confirmed by urinalysis. Patients had diagnosis of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. EEG data were recorded during a P300 task, and SE modulation and baseline CS were calculated. Both patient groups (cannabis users and non-users) exhibited significantly impaired SE modulation and elevated gamma and broadband CS, compared to HC. Crucially, no significant differences were found between the two patient groups in any of the EEG measures. Recent cannabis use does not appear to be the primary driver of the observed electrophysiological alterations in psychosis. Impaired SE modulation and increased CS are likely core features of psychosis itself, independent of recent cannabis exposure. This suggests that these EEG abnormalities may represent underlying vulnerability markers for psychosis. However, further research is needed to explore the potential long-term and early-onset effects of cannabis use on brain function in individuals with psychosis.