Analyses of structural changes in primary craniocervical dystonia through the software Freesurfer

Abstract

Craniocervical dystonia (CCD) is a neurological disorder that courses with involuntary muscle contractions, generating abnormal movements and postures. CCD includes the focal presentations of dystonia: blepharospasm, cervical, oromandibular, lingual and laryngeal dystonia. Its physiopathology has not been fully understood yet and neuroimage studies, using the voxel based morphometry, have described different structural changes on patients with the disease. These results, however, haven't been congruent among themselves. In such context, the automatized method of Freesurfer arises as an alternative, which has been showing a good validation by neurological studies. Therefore, this study aims to notice encephalic structural changes in CCD, through the use of the Freesurfer software.