Hippocampus and amygdala volumes are reduced in patients with schizoaffective disorder

• Published in: Psychiatry research. Neuroimaging 2024-08, Vol.342, p.111840, Article 111840
• Main Authors: Gurok, M. Gurkan, Aksoy, Dilek Bakis, Mermi, Osman, Korkmaz, Sevda, Tabara, Muhammed Fatih, Yildirim, Hanefi, Atmaca, Murad
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Amygdala; Hippocampus; MRI; Schizoaffective disorder
• ISSN: 0925-4927; 1872-7506; 1872-7506
• DOI: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2024.111840

•It has been acclaimed that the schizoaffective disorder might be a clinical entity placed in the spectrum from bipolar disorder to schizophrenia.•Schizoaffective disorder might have neuroanatomic similarities with both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.•Hippocampus and amygdala are important limbic and paralimbic brain regions which have some critical influences on emotional regulation.•To date, no study has examined hippocampus and amygdala volumes in patients with schizoaffective disorder.•Schizoaffective disorder seem to have smaller volumes of the hippocampus and amygdala regions and that our results were in accordance with those obtained both in patients with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. We aimed to examine the hippocampus and amygdala volumes in patients with schizoaffective disorder with the notion that schizoaffective disorder has strong resemblance of clinical presentation with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and that there have been studies on regions of interest volumes in patients with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder but not in patients with schizoaffective disorder. Eighteen patients with schizoaffective disorder and nineteen healthy controls were included into the study. Hippocampus and amygdala volumes were examined by using the MRI. Both hippocampus and amygdala volumes were statistically significantly reduced in patients with schizoaffective disorder compared to those of the healthy control comparisons (p