Assessment of severity of leukoaraiosis: a diffusional kurtosis imaging study.

OBJECTIVE: The objective was to investigate the capabilities of diffusional kurtosis imaging (DKI) in detection of age-related white matter (WM) changes in elderly patients with leukoaraiosis. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Fractional anisotropy (FA), kurtosis, and diffusion parameters in the frontal lobe and parietal lobe were compared between 14 patients at Fazekas scale 0 and 1, and 15 patients at Fazekas scale 2 and 3. RESULTS: FA and DKI parameters were significantly altered in the ischemic lesions vs normal regions of WM in the severe patients. CONCLUSION: DKI can provide sensitive imaging biomarkers for assessing the severity of leukoaraiosis in reference to Fazekas score.