Grey matter abnormalities in Tourette syndrome: an activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis

Abstract Background Tourette syndrome (TS) is a neurodevelopmental disorder defined by the continual presence of primary motor and vocal tics. Grey matter abnormalities have been identified in numerous studies TS, but conflicting results reported. This study was an unbiased statistical meta-analysis published neuroimaging TS structures. Methods A voxel quantitative technique called activation likelihood estimation (ALE) used. The included six involving 247 patients 236 healthy controls. threshold p < 0.05 established based on false discovery rate cluster extent 50 voxels. Results We found that grey volumes were significantly increased bilateral thalamus, right hypothalamus, precentral gyrus, left postcentral inferior parietal lobule, lentiform nucleus, insula compared to those In contrast, decreased anterior cingulate, insula, posterior cingulate gyrus Conclusions Our present primarily revealed significant increases thalamus Most these regions are associated with cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical circuits. Further larger sample sizes needed confirm changes patients.