Frontal lobe membrane phospholipid metabolism and ventricle to brain ratio in schizophrenia: preliminary 31P-MRS and CT studies.

A number of studies employing in vivo phosphorous-31 magnetic resonance spectroscopy (31P-MRS) have demonstrated altered measurements of frontal phospholipid and high energy phosphorus metabolism in schizophrenia. Enlargement of both the cerebroventricular system and the cortical sulci also has been reported as the most consistent pathological finding in schizophrenia by several investigators. To our knowledge, however, only two studies have simultaneously examined structural and functional aspects of the biological substrate of schizophrenia in the same patients. Moreover, they may have failed to find a significant correlation between these variables because of small sample sizes. The possible relationship between frontal lobe membrane phospholipid metabolism and ventricle-to-brain ratio (VBR) in patients with schizophrenia was investigated. In 31 schizophrenic patients, frontal lobe membrane phospholipid metabolism was measured by 31P-MRS, and VBR was measured by computed tomography (CT). Stepwise multiple regression analysis disclosed that VBR positively correlated only with increased phosphodiester (PDE) level (beta = 0.381, p = 0.0345), but with no other metabolites. This finding may provide evidence for an association between structural brain abnormality and altered frontal lobe membrane metabolism in schizophrenic patients, although the p-value of the finding is not high.