Neurodevelopment Hypothesis of Schizophrenia and the Structural Neuroimaging as a Tool to Prove it

Abstract: According to the neurodevelopment hypothesis of schizophrenia it is a disorder due to brain damaging during the intrauterine or early childhood years, manifesting decades later symptomatically.In a metaanalysis in 2001, 193 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) structural studies have been reviewed.The data confirmed earlier findings by computer tomography (CT) studies – consistent enlargement of the lateral and third ventricles and decreased volume of the temporal lobe.Decreased volume of the whole brain, ventricular dilatation, widening of the brain sulci are features defining brain atrophy.The most common CT markers of defining the brain atrophy are:1.Internal cerebrospinal fluid amplitudes:Frontal horns index (FHI); Huckmann’s number (HZ); Cella media index (CMI); III and IV ventricle amplitudes.2.External cerebrospinal fluid amplitudes:Cizternae insulares, Frontal interhaemispheric sulcus, Number of the sulci, Sulci width3.Temporal lobe amplitudeThe new directions of studying the structural anomalies of the schizophrenic brain lean towards studying more homogenic groups of patients, linking the changes to actual stages of the disorder, comparing structural with functional changes