Saturday, February 03, 2007

Semantic Dementia Lesions

Davies RR, Hodges JR et al. The pathologic basis of semantic dementia. Brain 2005; 128:1984-1995

18 cases with semantic language deficit and associative agnosias and sparing of other aspects oo cognition. 10 men, 8 women, mean onset age 58 mean age of death 68. 8 patients had behavioral disorder including disinhibition, apathy, reduced empathy, stereotypic behavior. Pathologically, 16 had FTD, 13 ubiquitin positive 11 in cortex 2 i inferior olive only; 3 had Picks disease in dentate gyrus, 2 had AD.

Most cased were ubiquitin positive and tau negative. Cases suggest an intriguing overlap with MND