Long-term remitted Cushing’s disease (LTRCD) patients commonly continue to present persistent psychological and cognitive deficits, and alterations in brain function and structure. Although previous studies have conducted gray matter volume analyses, assessing cortical thickness and surface area of LTRCD patients may offer further insight into the neuroanatomical substrates of Cushing’s disease. Structural 3T magnetic resonance images were obtained from 25 LTRCD patients, and 25 age-, gender-, and education-matched healthy controls (HCs). T1-weighted images were segmented using FreeSurfer software to extract mean cortical thickness and surface area values of 68 cortical gray matter regions and two whole hemispheres. Paired sample t tests explored differences between the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC; region of interest), and the whole brain. Validated scales assessed psychiatric symptomatology, self-reported cognitive functioning, and disease severity. After correction for multiple comparisons, ROI analyses indicated that LTRCD-patients showed reduced cortical thickness of the left caudal ACC and the right rostral ACC compared to HCs. Whole-brain analyses indicated thinner cortices of the left caudal ACC, left cuneus, left posterior cingulate cortex, right rostral ACC, and bilateral precuneus compared to HCs. No cortical surface area differences were identified. Cortical thickness of the left caudal ACC and left cuneus were inversely associated with anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, and disease duration, although certain associations did not persist after correction for multiple testing. In six of 68 regions examined, LTRCD patients had reduced cortical thickness in comparison to HCs. Cortical thickness of the left caudal ACC was inversely associated with disease duration. This suggests that prolonged and excessive exposure to glucocorticoids may be related to cortical thinning of brain structures involved in emotional and cognitive processing.

长期缓解库欣病 (LTRCD) 患者通常会继续出现持续的心理和认知缺陷以及大脑功能和结构的改变。尽管之前的研究已经进行了灰质体积分析，但评估 LTRCD 患者的皮质厚度和表面积可能有助于进一步了解库欣病的神经解剖学基础。从 25 名 LTRCD 患者和 25 名年龄、性别和教育程度匹配的健康对照 (HC) 中获得结构 3T 磁共振图像。使用 FreeSurfer 软件对 T1 加权图像进行分割，以提取 68 个皮质灰质区域和两个整个半球的平均皮质厚度和表面积值。配对样本t检验探讨了前扣带皮层（ACC；感兴趣区域）和整个大脑之间的差异。经过验证的量表评估了精神症状、自我报告的认知功能和疾病严重程度。经过多重比较校正后，ROI 分析表明，与 HC 相比，LTRCD 患者左尾 ACC 和右头 ACC 的皮质厚度减少。全脑分析表明，与 HC 相比，左尾 ACC、左楔叶、左后扣带皮层、右头侧 ACC 和双侧楔前叶的皮质更薄。没有发现皮质表面积差异。左尾 ACC 和左楔骨的皮质厚度与焦虑症状、抑郁症状和疾病持续时间呈负相关，尽管在多次测试校正后某些关联并未持续存在。在检查的 68 个区域中，有 6 个区域的 LTRCD 患者的皮质厚度比 HC 患者有所减少。 左尾 ACC 的皮质厚度与疾病持续时间呈负相关。这表明长期和过量接触糖皮质激素可能与涉及情绪和认知处理的大脑结构的皮质变薄有关。