Publications by authors named "Inga Koerte"

Background And Purpose: The absence of a consensus data quality control (DQC) process inhibits the widespread adoption of MR spectroscopy. Poor DQC can lead to unreliable clinical diagnosis and irreproducible research conclusions. Currently, manual visual assessment or the standard quantitative metrics of signal-to-noise, linewidth, and model fit are used as classifiers, but these measures may not be sufficient.

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Purpose: The impact of pediatric traumatic brain injury (pTBI) on health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in children and adolescents remains understudied. Short scales have some advantages in terms of economy and administration over longer scales, especially in younger children. The aim of the present study is to psychometrically evaluate the six-item German version of the QOLIBRI-OS-KID/ADO scale for children and adolescents.

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Characterizing cortical plasticity becomes increasingly important for identifying compensatory mechanisms and structural reserve in the ageing population. While cortical thickness (CT) largely contributed to systems neuroscience, it incompletely informs about the underlying neuroplastic pathophysiology. In turn, microstructural characteristics may correspond to atrophy mechanisms in a more sensitive way.

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  • The study investigates the relationship between perivascular space (PVS) volume in the brain and lifetime exposure to repetitive head impacts (RHI) in individuals at risk for neurodegenerative diseases, particularly focusing on former American football players.
  • Conducted across four US study sites from 2016 to 2020, the research involved 224 participants, including 170 former football players and 54 control participants, with analyses exploring how PVS volume correlates with cognitive impairment.
  • Results showed that former football players exhibited larger PVS volumes compared to the control group, suggesting that RHI exposure could contribute to changes in brain structure associated with neurodegeneration.
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  • Exposure to repetitive head impacts (RHI) correlates with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), which can only be diagnosed after death; the study explores the presence of a cavum septum pellucidum (CSP) in living former football players to understand its relation to RHI and potential CTE.
  • The research involved 175 former players, both college and professional, and compared their CSP measurements to a control group without RHI exposure, assessing associations with cumulative head impact and traumatic encephalopathy syndrome (TES).
  • Results indicated that former players had significantly higher CSP presence and ratio compared to controls, with professional players exhibiting an even greater ratio; however, there was no notable link between CSP and TES or provisional
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Background: Military veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) commonly experience posttraumatic guilt. Guilt over commission or omission evolves when responsibility is assumed for an unfortunate outcome (e.g.

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  • Many veterans experience intimate partner violence (IPV) and risk factors for this include things like combat experiences, PTSD, and depression.
  • The study looked at 49 male veterans to see if problems in their brain, specifically in the limbic system, relate to their likelihood of committing IPV.
  • Results showed that veterans with PTSD, depression, or other issues were more likely to engage in IPV, especially if they had more stress from war.
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Assessment of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) after pediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI) has been limited in children and adolescents due to a lack of disease-specific instruments. To fill this gap, the Quality of Life after Traumatic Brain Injury for Children and Adolescents (QOLIBRI-KID/ADO) Questionnaire was developed for the German-speaking population. Reference values from a comparable general population are essential for comprehending the impact of TBI on health and well-being.

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Until recently, no disease-specific health-related quality of life (HRQoL) questionnaire existed for pediatric traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). In this revalidation study, the psychometric properties and the validity of the 35-item QOLIBRI-KID/ADO questionnaire in its final German version were examined in 300 children and adolescents. It is the first self-reported TBI-specific tool for measuring pediatric HRQoL in individuals aged between 8 and 17 years.

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  • The German Rivermead Post-Concussion Symptoms Questionnaire (RPQ) is an effective tool for measuring post-concussion symptoms in children aged 8-12 after experiencing a traumatic brain injury (TBI).
  • A study examined the reliability and validity of the RPQ using a sample of 146 children, finding strong internal consistency and a better three-factor model for assessing symptoms compared to the original one-factor model.
  • Findings indicate that the RPQ proxy ratings correlate well with other established measures (PCSI-P, PHQ-9, GAD-7), confirming its use as a reliable method for assessing post-concussion symptoms in children and adolescents.
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  • * A study evaluated brain structures using MRI in 170 former football players and 54 controls, assessing regions associated with CTE pathology, revealing significant reductions in cortical thickness and volume in players compared to controls.
  • * Former professional players showed more pronounced brain changes than former college players, specifically in areas like the hippocampus and amygdala, indicating that exposure to head impacts has lasting effects on brain structure.
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Background: Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is common in children. Long-term cognitive and behavioral outcomes as well as underlying structural brain alterations following pediatric mTBI have yet to be determined. In addition, the effect of age-at-injury on long-term outcomes is largely unknown.

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The Balance Error Scoring System (BESS) is a commonly used method for clinically evaluating balance after traumatic brain injury. The utilization of force plates, characterized by their cost-effectiveness and portability, facilitates the integration of instrumentation into the BESS protocol. Despite the enhanced precision associated with instrumented measures, there remains a need to determine the clinical significance and feasibility of such measures within pediatric cohorts.

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Background And Objectives: Obstructive sleep apnea (SA) is common in older men and a contributor to negative cognitive, psychiatric, and brain health outcomes. Little is known about SA in those who played contact sports and are at increased risk of neurodegenerative disease(s) and other neuropathologies associated with repetitive head impacts (RHI). In this study, we investigated the frequency of diagnosed and witnessed SA and its contribution to clinical symptoms and tau pathology using PET imaging among male former college and former professional American football players.

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Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a significant, global public health concern. Women, individuals with historically underrepresented identities, and disabilities are at high risk for IPV and tend to experience severe injuries. There has been growing concern about the risk of exposure to IPV-related head trauma, resulting in IPV-related brain injury (IPV-BI), and its health consequences.

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Background And Objectives: Recent data link exposure to repetitive head impacts (RHIs) from American football with increased white matter hyperintensity (WMH) burden. WMH might have unique characteristics in the context of RHI beyond vascular risk and normal aging processes. We evaluated biological correlates of WMH in former American football players, including markers of amyloid, tau, inflammation, axonal injury, neurodegeneration, and vascular health.

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The majority of traumatic encephalopathy syndrome (TES) cases have been reported in former contact sport athletes. This is the first case with TES in a 19-year-old male patient with progressive cognitive decline after daily domestic physical violence through repeated hits to the head for 15 years. The patient presented with a moderate depressive episode and progressive cognitive decline.

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Pediatric health-related quality of life (HRQoL) as a measure of subjective wellbeing and functioning has received increasing attention over the past decade. HRQoL in children and adolescents following pediatric traumatic brain injury (pTBI) has been poorly studied, and performing adequate measurements in this population is challenging. This study compares child/adolescent and parent reports of HRQoL following pTBI using the newly developed Quality of Life after Brain Injury in Children and Adolescents (QOLIBRI-KID/ADO) questionnaire.

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Background: Post-concussion symptoms (PCS) are a common consequence of pediatric traumatic brain injury (pTBI). They include cognitive, emotional, and physical disturbances. To address the lack of age-adapted instruments assessing PCS after pTBI, this study examines the psychometric properties of the German 17-item post-TBI version of the Postconcussion Symptom Inventory (PCSI-SR8) in children aged 8-12 years.

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Article Synopsis
  • * Researchers utilized various MRI data types to identify brain features that can distinguish PTSD from controls, revealing that classification accuracy decreases significantly when using multi-site data compared to single-site studies.
  • * The denoising variational autoencoder (DVAE) model showed improved generalization on new datasets, indicating its potential for better classification of PTSD, although overall performance still remained only slightly above chance levels.
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Background: Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI) are common in Veterans and linked to behavioral disturbances, increased risk of cognitive decline, and Alzheimer's disease.

Objective: We studied the synergistic effects of PTSD and TBI on behavioral, cognitive, and neuroimaging measures in Vietnam war Veterans.

Methods: Data were acquired at baseline and after about one-year from male Veterans categorized into: PTSD, TBI, PTSD+TBI, and Veteran controls without PTSD or TBI.

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The gray matter/white matter (GM/WM) boundary of the brain is vulnerable to shear strain associated with mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). It is, however, unknown whether GM/WM microstructure is associated with long-term outcomes following mTBI. The diffusion and structural MRI data of 278 participants between 18 and 65 years of age with and without military background from the Department of Defense INTRuST study were analyzed.

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The subjective impact of the consequences of pediatric traumatic brain injury (pTBI) on different life dimensions should be assessed multidimensionally and as sensitively as possible using a disease-specific health-related quality of life (HRQoL) instrument. The development and psychometrics of the first such self-report questionnaire for children and adolescents after TBI are reported here. Focus group interviews with children, adolescents, and their parents, cognitive debriefing, item pool generation and reduction using Delphi expert panels were performed.

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