Loss of entorhinal cortex and hippocampal volumes compared to whole brain volume in normal aging: The SMART-Medea study

In non-demented elderly age-related decline in hippocampal volume has often been observed, but it is not clear if this loss is disproportionate relative to other brain tissue. Few studies examined age-related volume loss of the entorhinal cortex. We investigated the association of age with hippocampal and entorhinal cortex (ERC) volumes in a large sample of middle-aged and older persons without dementia. Within the SMART-Medea study, cross-sectional analyses were performed in 453 non-demented subjects (mean age 62 ± 9 years, 81% male) with a history of arterial disease. Hippocampal and ERC volumes were assessed by manual segmentation on three-dimensional fast field-echo sequence T1-weighted magnetic resonance images. Automated segmentation was used to quantify volumes of BV and ICV. Hippocampal and ERC volumes were divided by intracranial volume (ICV) as well as total brain volume (BV) to determine whether age-related differences were disproportionate relative to other brain tissue. Total crude hippocampal volume was 5.96 ± 0.7 ml and total crude ERC volume was 0.34 ± 0.06 ml. Linear regression analyses adjusted for sex showed that with increasing age, hippocampal volume divided by ICV decreased (B per year older = − 0.01 ml; 95% CI − 0.02 to − 0.004). However, no age-related decline in hippocampal volume relative to BV was observed (B per year older = 0.005 ml; 95% CI − 0.002 to 0.01). No age-related decline in ERC volume relative to ICV or BV was observed. In this population of nondemented patients with a history of vascular disease no age-related decline in entorhinal cortex volume was observed and although hippocampal volume decreased with age, it was not disproportionate relative to total brain volume.