Morphometry of the pituitary gland and hypothalamus in long-term survivors of childhood trauma

Chronic pituitary dysfunction is increasingly recognized as a sequela of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Our aim was to rule out any late morphometric changes of the pituitary gland and hypothalamus in survivors of TBI during childhood requiring intensive care.

We assessed morphometric abnormalities of the sella region and hypothalamus in patients who sustained TBI during childhood. The patients showed no clinical hormonal dysfunction at the acute phase and pituitary hormone levels at the time of our study were within normal limits. From the 18 enrolled patients in the magnetic resonance study, five were removed due to morphological changes or anatomical variations. We studied the MRI of 13 male survivors (mean age 27 years, mean time after trauma 20 years) and compared them to 13 male control subjects who were matched in terms of age (mean age, 26 years), education and ethnicity. Analyses of the pituitary gland and sella on a midsagittal T2- and T1-weighted image were performed. We used voxel-based morphometry (VBM), an unbiased MRI morphometric method to investigate hypothalamic region in this group of patients.

There was only a trend towards a reduced pituitary gland width in the patient group compared to controls. However, no significant morphological and morphometric abnormality was seen and VBM showed no hypothalamic grey matter loss.

In the absence of hormonal dysfunction, no persisting morphometric changes of the pituitary gland and hypothalamus were seen in survivors of childhood TBI requiring intensive care.