Validation of a protocol for manual segmentation of the thalamus on magnetic resonance imaging scans

Abstract

We present a validated protocol for manual segmentation of the thalamus on T1-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans using brain image analysis software. The MRI scans of five normal control subjects were randomly selected from a larger cohort recruited from Lund University Hospital and Landskrona Hospital, Sweden. MRIs were performed using a 3.0T Philips MR scanner, with an eight-channel head coil, and high resolution images were acquired using a T1-weighted turbo field echo (T1 TFE) pulse sequence, with resulting voxel size 1×1×1mm3. Manual segmentation of the left and right thalami and volume measurement was performed on 28-30 contiguous coronal slices, using ANALYZE 11.0 softwar..