Abstract #4052

Longitudinal assessment of cervical cord atrophy across MS clinical phenotypes: a multicenter study

Paola Valsasina¹, Maria Assunta Rocca¹, Mohammad Ahmad Abdullah Ali Aboulwafa¹, Paolo Preziosa¹, Frederik Barkhof², Hugo Vrenken², Claudio Gobbi³, Chiara Zecca³, Alex Rovira⁴, Xavier Montalban⁵, Hugh Kearney⁶, Olga Ciccarelli⁶, Lucy Matthews⁷, Jacqueline Palace⁷, Antonio Gallo⁸, Alvino Bisecco⁸, Achim Gass⁹, Philipp Eisele⁹, Carsten Lukas¹⁰, Barbara Bellenberg¹⁰, Giancarlo Comi¹¹, and Massimo Filippi¹

¹Neuroimaging Research Unit, San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Milan, Italy, ²MS Centre Amsterdam, VU Medical Centre, Amsterdam, Netherlands, ³Department of Neurology, Neurocenter of Southern Switzerland, Lugano, Switzerland, ⁴Department of Radiology, Hospital Universitari Vall d'Hebron, Barcelona, Spain, ⁵Department of Neurology, Hospital Universitari Vall d'Hebron, Barcelona, Spain, ⁶Queen Square MS Centre, UCL Institute of Neurology, London, United Kingdom, ⁷Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom, ⁸MRI Center "SUN-FISM", Second University of Naples, Naples, Italy, ⁹Universitaetsmedizin Mannheim, University of Heidelberg, Mannheim, Germany, ¹⁰St Josef Hospital, Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, Germany, ¹¹Department of Neurology, San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Milan, Italy

Aims of this large, multicenter study were to characterize baseline cervical cord atrophy in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) compared with healthy controls, and to evaluate the modification of cervical cord cross-sectional area (CSA) over one-year of follow-up in such patients. Results indicated that baseline cord atrophy was present in MS patients vs controls, with a differential effect across phenotypes and a greater severity of atrophy in the progressive forms of the disease. Significant CSA decrease over time was found in relapsing remitting, primary progressive MS and in clinically worsened patients.

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