AUTHOR=Schinz David , Schmitz-Koep Benita , Tahedl Marlene , Teckenberg Timo , Schultz Vivian , Schulz Julia , Zimmer Claus , Sorg Christian , Gaser Christian , Hedderich Dennis M. 

TITLE=Lower cortical thickness and increased brain aging in adults with cocaine use disorder

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychiatry

VOLUME=14

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychiatry/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1266770

DOI=10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1266770

ISSN=1664-0640

ABSTRACT=<sec id="sec1"><title>Background</title><p>Cocaine use disorder (CUD) is a global health issue with severe behavioral and cognitive sequelae. While previous evidence suggests a variety of structural and age-related brain changes in CUD, the impact on both, cortical thickness and brain age measures remains unclear.</p></sec><sec id="sec2"><title>Methods</title><p>Derived from a publicly available data set (SUDMEX_CONN), 74 CUD patients and 62 matched healthy controls underwent brain MRI and behavioral-clinical assessment. We determined cortical thickness by surface-based morphometry using CAT12 and Brain Age Gap Estimate (BrainAGE) via relevance vector regression. Associations between structural brain changes and behavioral-clinical variables of patients with CUD were investigated by correlation analyses.</p></sec><sec id="sec3"><title>Results</title><p>We found significantly lower cortical thickness in bilateral prefrontal cortices, posterior cingulate cortices, and the temporoparietal junction and significantly increased BrainAGE in patients with CUD [mean (SD) = 1.97 (±3.53)] compared to healthy controls (<italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.001, Cohen’s <italic>d</italic> = 0.58). Increased BrainAGE was associated with longer cocaine abuse duration.</p></sec><sec id="sec4"><title>Conclusion</title><p>Results demonstrate structural brain abnormalities in CUD, particularly lower cortical thickness in association cortices and dose-dependent, increased brain age.</p></sec>