Radiologic Imaging in Psychiatric Disorders: Recent Developments

In recent years with emerging developments in radiological imaging techniques, it has been possible to determine the underlying morphologic, metabolic and even molecular pathologic basis of psychiatric disorders. In this review, we aimed to gather under the main headings, the spectrum of the imaging methods used in diagnosing psychiatric major diseases, characteristics of the existing systems, update information and future expectations. There is multitudinous published studies in the literature related to almost all psychiatric disorders and syndromes and the knowledge about them are much more than expected. As could easily be observed from literature evaluation, studies on computed tomography is almost ended, and MRI studies are shifted to advanced submodalities such as; fMRI, DWI, DTI. Combined imaging modalities like PET/CT and PET/MRI provide useful information in determination of metabolic activity of o focal or diffuse lesion area. Functional information is an helpful modality for directing the lesion localization especially in normal cross-sectional images and in the follow-up of the response to treatment. Radiologically, in the light of recent advances mainly depending on the MRI and PET technology; it is possible to identify the volumetric, functional, metabolic differences of the whole brain or of a special area. Thus the abnormalities in these mentioned parameters could also be evaluated for psychiatric diseases. In recent studies, anatomical based imaging principles somehow prone to shift molecular based imaging methods. So these genetic-molecular based studies currently ongoing in the experimental stage that make it possible to diagnose and monitor the primary pathology, give hope for the future of the imaging in psychiatric diseases.