Developmental brain trajectories in children with ADHD and controls: a longitudinal neuroimaging study

Silk, TJ; Genc, S; Anderson, V; Efron, D; Hazell, P; Nicholson, Jan; Kean, M; Malpas, CB; Sciberras, E

doi:10.26181/22002140.v1

Developmental brain trajectories in children with ADHD and controls: a longitudinal neuroimaging study

journal contribution

posted on 2023-02-02, 23:11 authored by TJ Silk, S Genc, V Anderson, D Efron, P Hazell, Jan NicholsonJan Nicholson, M Kean, CB Malpas, E Sciberras

Background: The symptom profile and neuropsychological functioning of individuals with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), change as they enter adolescence. It is unclear whether variation in brain structure and function parallels these changes, and also whether deviations from typical brain development trajectories are associated with differential outcomes. This paper describes the Neuroimaging of the Children's Attention Project (NICAP), a comprehensive longitudinal multimodal neuroimaging study. Primary aims are to determine how brain structure and function change with age in ADHD, and whether different trajectories of brain development are associated with variations in outcomes including diagnostic persistence, and academic, cognitive, social and mental health outcomes. Methods/Design: NICAP is a multimodal neuroimaging study in a community-based cohort of children with and without ADHD. Approximately 100 children with ADHD and 100 typically developing controls will be scanned at a mean age of 10 years (range; 9-11years) and will be re-scanned at two 18-month intervals (ages 11.5 and 13 years respectively). Assessments include a structured diagnostic interview, parent and teacher questionnaires, direct child cognitive/executive functioning assessment and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). MRI acquisition techniques, collected at a single site, have been selected to provide optimized information concerning structural and functional brain development. Discussion: This study will allow us to address the primary aims by describing the neurobiological development of ADHD and elucidating brain features associated with differential clinical/behavioral outcomes. NICAP data will also be explored to assess the impact of sex, ADHD presentation, ADHD severity, comorbidities and medication use on brain development trajectories. Establishing which brain regions are associated with differential clinical outcomes, may allow us to improve predictions about the course of ADHD.

Funding

The study was funded by the National Medical Health and Research Council of Australia (NHMRC; project grant #1065895). The Children's Attention Project was as funded by an NHMRC project grant #1008522 and a grant from the Collier Foundation. The research was supported by the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, The Royal Children's Hospital, The Royal Children's Hospital Foundation, Department of Paediatrics at The University of Melbourne and the Victorian Government's Operational Infrastructure Support Program. ES was supported by NHMRC Early Career (1037159) and Career Development (1110688) Fellowships. TS was supported by an NHMRC Career Development Award (1004637). VA was supported by an NHMRC Senior Practitioner Fellowship (1079478). JN was funded by the Australian Communities Foundation through the Roberta Holmes Chair for the Transition to Contemporary Parenthood Program (Coronella sub-fund).

History

Publication Date

2016-03-11

Journal

BMC Psychiatry

Volume

16

Issue

1

Article Number

59

Pagination

9p. (p. 1-9)

Publisher

BioMed Central

ISSN

1471-244X

Rights Statement

© 2016 Silk et al. Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.