Decreased Basal Ganglia Volume in Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy

Background and Purpose Cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) is a common pathology of the leptomeningeal and cortical small vessels associated with hemorrhagic and non-hemorrhagic brain injury. Given previous evidence for CAA-related loss of cortical thickness and white matter volume, we hypothesized that CAA might also cause tissue loss in the basal ganglia. Methods We compared basal ganglia volumes expressed as a percentage of total intracranial volume (pBGV) of non-demented patients with sporadic and hereditary CAA to age-matched healthy control (HC) and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) cohorts. Results Patients with sporadic CAA had lower pBGV (n=80, 1.16%±0.14%) compared to HC (n=80, 1.30%±0.13%, P