Changes in the regional cerebral blood flow in schizophrenia and depression detected with single photon emission computed tomography

Objective: To explore the role of single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) in diagnosis and location of brain dysfunction in schizophrenia and major depression. Methods: Regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) of 39 patients (27 with schizophrenia and 12 with major depression) who suffered from the diseases and did not take medicine and 10 normal controls were examined by SPECT. The 27 patients with schizophrenia were tested with positive and negative syndrome (PANSS) and 12 patients with depression were tested with Homilton (HAMD). Results: The positive rates of rCBF abnormality in positive symptom group of schizophrenia, negative symptom group of schizophrenia and depression group were 54.54%, 75.00% and 83.33%, respectively. The decrease of rCBF in patients with schizophrenia and depression was the main feature. The rCBF abnormality in schizophrenia group involved temporal, frontal, parietal lobes and there was a correlation between the reduction of rCBF in frontal and negative symptom of schizophrenia. The decrease of rCBF in patients with depression was in the temporal or frontal lobes and rCBF abnormality was mainly in the left brain. Conclusion: There were different features in rCBF abnormality between subtypes of schizophrenia and depression. SPECT is very important in diagnosis and study of location of brain dysfunction in schizophrenia and depression.