Differentiation of Pathological Processes and Clinical Forms in Multiple Sclerosis: A Tract Based Spatial Statistics Study.

Salem Hannoun^1,2, Francoise Durand-Dubief^1,3, Danielle Ibarrola², Jean Christophe Comte², Christian Confavreux³, Dominique Sappey-Marinier^1,2

his study aims to characterize the pathological processes and differentiate the clinical forms of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients using tract based spatial statistics (TBSS). Significant decreases of FA values were observed in numerous white matter regions of MS patients (SP, PP and RR forms) when compared to control subjects. These decreases were also more pronounced when comparing patients with more advanced forms (SP and PP) to RR patients while no significant differences were observed between SP and PP groups. This technique constitutes an important new tool to follow the disease progression and better characterize the alterations extent between patients clinical status.