1 Sep 2008
ReviewBrain CT scan indexes in the normal pressure hydrocephalus: predictive value in the outcome of patients and correlation to the clinical symptoms
Emmanuel Chatzidakis 1George Barlas 1Nicolas Condilis 2Dimos Bouramas 3Demetrios Anagnostopoulos 3Zacharias Volikas 4Konstantinos Simopoulos 4
Affiliations
Article Info
1 Department of Neurosurgery, General State Hospital of Nikaia, Piraeus «Saint Panteleimon», Greece
2 Department of Familiar Medicine, 6th Municipal Health Center of Athens, Greece
3 Department of Neurosurgery, General Hospital of Athens «KAT», Greece
4 Division of Surgery, University of Thrace, Greece
Ann. Ital. Chir., 2008, 79(5), 101767;
Published: 1 Sep 2008
Copyright © 2008 Annali Italiani di Chirurgia
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Abstract
The aim of this study is to find out the correlation of the ventricular size of the brain, as it is estimated using brain computed tomography (CT) scan indexes in patients with normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH), to: a) the clinical symptoms, and b) the results of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) shunting procedures. We looked for any predictive value in the estimation of brain CT scan indexes, in patients as above, in whom a shunt is going to be placed. It is well known that it is very difficult to decide who is going to improve after shunting. We studied 40 cases of patients with the diagnosis «NPH» in whom the ventricular shunts were placed. Every symptom (motor disturbance, deficit of memory, incontinence) was separately evaluated preoperatively. The outcome of shunting was also evaluated and the patients were graded. The following CT scan indexes were estimated from the preoperative CT scans of the brain in every case: the ventricle-brain ratio (VBR), the bi-caudate and bi-frontal ratios, the third ventricle-Sylvian fissure (3V-SF) ratio, and the four largest cortical gyri. The method we have used for statistics is «one way analysis of variance», correlating the CT scan indexes to the symptoms of the patients preoperatively, and the outcome of them postoperatively. The main conclusion is that the size of the lateral ventricles of the brain preoperatively is not correlated to the outcome after CSF shunting surgery, but it is correlated to the symptoms of NPH preoperatively.
Keywords
- Brain CT scan indexes
- CSF shunting outcome
- CSF shunting procedures
- Hydrocephalus
- Normal pressure hydrocephalus
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