Henry Rusinek1,
Jenny Ha2, Po Lai Yau2, Aziz Tirsi2, Wai Hon
Tsui2, Antonio Convit2
1Radiology,
NYU School of Medicine, New York, United States; 2Psychiatry, NYU
School of Medicine, New York, United States
The obesity epidemic is responsible for the increasing prevalence of Type 2 diabetes (DB). Using a high-resolution ASL we present evidence that brain perfusion and vascular reactivity are affected in the early stage of DB. Insulin resistant (IR) subjects had significantly lower (p=0.008) resting gray matter flow (60.04.5) compared to healthy controls (63.66.4), with a trend for hypoperfusion in DB. There was a significant detrimental effect of obesity on vascular reactivity. Our findings suggest that cerebral blood flow and vascular reactivity changes resulting from obesity and insulin resistance are reversible.