Table 4

Sonographic evaluation of mesencephalic raphe nuclei in patients with Huntington disease and correlation to clinical data of depressive symptoms

Variable	Normal echogenicity of the brain stem raphe, n = 20	Pathologic echogenicity of the brain stem raphe, n = 19	p value	Sensitivity	Specificity
HAM-D^* score, mean (SIQR) [range]	8.8 (8.3) [1–30]	16.8 (7.6) [3–34]	0.014^*
BDI score, mean (SIQR) [range]	9.3 (8.5) [0–27]	14.4 (10.8) [2–39]	0.031^*
No. patients (grade 1/grade 0)
Currently depressed, n = 21	6	15 (10/5)	0.004^†	71.4	77.8
Currently not depressed, n = 18	14	4 (4/0)
Previous depression, n = 30	11	19 (14/5)	0.001^†	63.3	100
No previous depression, n = 9	9	0 (0/0)
Psychiatric disturbances prior to motor symptoms, n = 17	5	12 (9/3)	0.025^†	70.6	68.2
Motor symptoms prior to psychiatric disturbances, n = 22	15	7 (4/2)
Cumulative duration of depressive episodes, mean (SD) [range]	15.5 (29.5) [0–110]	39.2 (45.6) [3–120]	0.007^*

BDI = Beck Depression Inventory;18 HAM-D^* = Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression with the exclusion of items 7–9, 13, and 16;19 SD = standard deviation; SIQR = semi-interquartile range ([upper – lower quartile] ÷ 2).
↵* Mann–Whitney U test.
↵† Fisher exact test.