Spinal cord morphometry — a promising technique to track disease course in ALS

Measurement of the cross-sectional area of the cervical spinal cord could aid the tracking of disease progression in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), according to research published in NeuroImage: Clinical. A team at the University of Campinas, Brazil performed brain and spinal cord MRI scans at baseline and 8 months later in 27 patients with ALS and 27 healthy controls. Of the various MRI-based parameters that were assessed, cervical spinal cord area reduction was found to be the most sensitive to longitudinal changes on the ALS Functional Rating Scale-Revised, which detects clinical deterioration in patients with ALS. The researchers conclude that spinal cord morphometry could provide a useful biomarker for longitudinal change in ALS, particularly in the later stages when brain degeneration might have plateaued.