Comparison of anterior cingulate cortex, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, amygdala, hippocampus volumes of individuals with Bipolar Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder

It is believed that Bipolar Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder are included in the Bipolar spectrum of the two diseases due to their overlapping symptoms and Borderline Personality Disorder may be an atypical form of Bipolar Disorder. In our thesis study, we aimed to compare the volumes of amygdala, hippocampus, anterior cingulate cortex, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex between Bipolar Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder patient groups using MR imaging Twenty patients diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder and twenty patients diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder who were admitted to the Mental Health and Diseases clinic of Fırat University Hospital as outpatients or receieved inpatient treatment at the clinic participated in our study. Sociodemographic and Clinical Data Form, Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS) and Barratt İmpulsivity Scale-11 were applied to the participants and the volume of brain areas were measured by MR imaging. No significant difference was found between the Bipolar Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder groups in the brain areas of amygdala, hippocampus, anterior cingulate cortex and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. This result consistent with the hypothesis that the two diseases may belong to the same spectrum. İn conclusion our study is one of the first imaging studies to evaluate neuroanatomical differences in patients with Bipolar Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder. Due to the limitations of our study, it needs to be supported by prospective studies with larger sample sizes.