Improved Sensitivity & Specificity in the Diagnosis of Parkinson's Disease from Diffusion Kurtosis Imaging

JiunJie Wang¹, WeyYil Lin², ChinSung Lu³, Ali Tabesh⁴, YiHsin Weng, YauYau Wai

The mean diffusion kurtosis was measured from 30 patient of idiopathic Parkinsons Disease. Compared with diffusion tensor derived indices, such as Fractional Anisotropy and mean/axial/radial diffusivity, the mean kurtosis in the basal ganglia has significantly improved diagnostic performance in differentiating from normal controls. The receiver operative curve analysis showed the best performance in substantia nigra, which has a sensitivity and specificity of approximately 0.87 and 0.92.