Specificity of the neuropsychological syndromes of the disturbance of higher mental functions in Alzheimer's disease and senile dementia

1992 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 447-451 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. K. Korsakova ◽  
N. R. Dybovskaya ◽  
I. F. Roshchina ◽  
S. I. Gavrilova
2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. e0303104
Author(s):  
Iryna Mudrenko

Background Dementia is the age-related disease. At the same time, the elderly age has one of the peaks in the number of suicides. Psychology of patients with demetia is characterized by the feeling of hopelessness, pessimism, awareness of own insolvency, dependence on others, that affects the risk of suicide. It is established that the highest risk of suicide in the early stages of dementia with the progression of cognitive deficit, the risk of suicide decreases. Aim To study the role of impairment of higher mental functions (perception, reasoning, attention, memory, emotions, will, speech) in the formation of suicidal behaviour in patients with dementia in Alzheimer's disease. Materials and methods There were examined 75 patients with dementia in Alzheimer's disease, 36 patients with a history of suicidal behavior composed the main group, and 39 patients without the signs of suicidal behavior composed control group. The study was carried out using clinical-anamnestic, psychopathological methods and mathematical statistical methods. Results The high risk of suicide in dementia caused by Alzheimer's disease is combined with the inhibition of thinking, the delusional ideas of self-blame and self-effacement (p ≤ 0.05); depressed mood, inner agitation, anxiety, feeling of despair, hopelessness, guilt, melancholia, apathy (p ≤ 0.05); effector-volitional disorders in the form of hypobulia, hypokinesia, hypomimia, decreased libido (p ≤ 0.05); speech disturbance in the form of bradylalia p ≤ 0.05; greater exhaustion and decreased attention (p ≤ 0.05). On the contrary, the following peculiarities of higher mental functions, namely thought disorder are referred to the anti-risk factors of suicide in dementia caused by Alzheimer's disease: the delusional ideas of relation and damage (p ≤ 0.05); emotions: the feeling of fear (p ≤ 0.05); effector-volitional sphere: parabulia and hyperkinesia (p ≤ 0.05). Conclusion On the basis of clinical and psychopathological study of patients with dementia in Alzheimer's disease, the specific impairment of higher mental functions and emotional-volitional spheres reasoning, memory, attention, perception, speech, emotions) are identified associated with high risk of suicide.


1997 ◽  
Vol 8 (S3) ◽  
pp. 321-324 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joan M. Swearer ◽  
David A. Drachman

Although Alzheimer's original description of the dementing disorder that bears his name emphasized the prominence of troublesome and disruptive behaviors, a systematic investigation of behavioral disturbances of dementia did not begin in earnest until the 1980s. At that time, as the neuropathologic identity of presenile Alzheimer's disease and late-onset “senile dementia” was recognized, the redefinition of Alzheimer's disease abruptly increased the number of patients diagnosed with this condition. Physicians and other medical personnel working with Alzheimer's disease patients recognized both the importance of abnormal behaviors in this now large patient population and the need to describe, classify, and quantify these behaviors.


1943 ◽  
Vol 89 (374) ◽  
pp. 1-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Stengel

Many problems concerning Alzheimer's disease and Pick's disease are still awaiting clarification. In this country Henderson was the first to draw attention to the considerable importance of Alzheimer's disease in clinical psychiatry. Valuable work has been contributed by various writers in recent years (Grunthal, 1936; Critchley, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1938; Schottky, 1932; Thorpe, 1932; Rothschild, 1934; Malamud, Lowenberg and co-workers, 1929; Mayer-Gross, 1938; Kasanin and Crank, 1933; Jervis and Soltz, 1936; McMenemy, a.o., 1939). While Pick's disease has retained its position as a clinical entity based mainly on the characteristic anatomical picture, the position of Alzheimer's disease in the system of psychiatry has become more complicated; for instance atypical cases have been described presenting the anatomical characters of Alzheimer's disease, though not fitting into the original clinical conception of that disease. Lowenberg and his co-workers (1929) are inclined to regard Alzheimer's disease as a syndrome rather than a clinical entity. Many contributors have directed their main interest to the pathological changes. The knowledge of the symptomatology of those conditions is still incomplete. Further intensive study may enable us not only to base the diagnosis and differential diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease and Pick's disease on more solid clinical knowledge than hitherto, but also to recognize the early stages of those diseases before advancing cerebral degeneration effaces their characteristic clinical features. Unfortunately, most of the cases come under the observation of the psychiatrist only in the later stages of their illness, and it seems that the comparatively small proportion of the mental hospital population they represent does not reflect the incidence of those diseases. It is very likely that many patients die from intercurrent illnesses before their mental condition is recognized or sufficiently advanced to make admission to a mental hospital necessary. The differential diagnosis of those conditions offers considerable difficulties which often may prove insuperable. Alzheimer's disease and Pick's disease have to be distinguished not only from each other but from conditions of vascular origin, from senile dementia and various atypical conditions which occur at the same age period during which Alzheimer's disease and Pick's disease usually develop. Only careful collection and analysis of clinical observations and their scrutiny by pathological investigations can increase our still limited knowledge in this important field of psychiatry.


1994 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. B. Goodall ◽  
A. H. Reid ◽  
D. J. Findlay ◽  
C. Hind ◽  
J. Kay ◽  
...  

An excess of irregularly di storted red cells with spiked forms (acanthocytes. spur cells) has been found in a substantial minority of patient s with seni le dementia of Alzheimer type (7 of 50 patients, 3 of 21 men and 4 of 29 women). Of 100 control patients, 42 men and 58 women), 5 (men and 2 women) showed comparable distortion, but, of these, one man may well have incipient dementia and the others had serious organic di seases which may be associated with comparable erythrocytic changes. The cause of the distortion is not yet clear, but the presence of occasional giant erythrocytes in the absence of general macrocytosis suggests a possible abnormality of cell membrane synthes is. This distortion may be a useful marker in patients with loss of memory. Whether it is a manifestation of a haemopoietic clone or a constitutional anomaly associated with Alzheimer’s disease remains to be seen.


1998 ◽  
Vol 4 (6) ◽  
pp. 360-363 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Jane Byrne

Dementia with cortical Lewy bodies (LBD) was first described by Okazakiet alin 1961 and is now recognised as a relatively common cause of the dementia syndrome. The true prevalence of LBD is unknown. In post-mortem studies of patients diagnosed as having dementia in life, the mean frequency of Lewy body dementia is 12.5% (Byrne, 1997). Clinically diagnosed LBD (using operational clinical criteria) is found in 10–23% of patients presenting to, or in the care of, psychogeriatric services (Collertonet al, 1996). What is not yet certain is its nosological status; opinion is divided between regarding it as a variety of Alzheimer's disease (the Lewy body variant), a distinct disease (senile dementia of the Lewy body type) or a spectrum disorder related to both Parkinson's disease and to Alzheimer's disease (Byrne, 1992).


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