Anosognosia in Mild Cognitive Impairment and Mild Alzheimer's Disease: Frequency and Neuropsychological Correlates

Severity of Dementia, Anosognosia, and Depression in Relation to the Quality of Life of Patients with Alzheimer Disease: Discrepancies Between Patients and Caregivers

“…One of the most important in this regard concerns the large discrepancy between patient and caregiver reports of quality of life, (3,19) this being particularly notable as the severity of dementia increases; (12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20) other factors to consider in this regard are the influence of depression (21) and reduced awareness of deficits (anosognosia) in the patient. (22)(23)(24)(25)(26) In light of the above the aims of the present study were as follows: 1) to determine the influence of severity of dementia, depression and anosognosia as regards the discrepancies between patient and caregiver reports of QoLp; and 2) to identify specific groups of patients associated with these discrepancies.…”

Subjective Cognitive Impairment and Affective Symptoms: A systematic review

“…It is important to note that individuals with MCI also have SCI (self-or informant-reported) as part of MCI's diagnostic criteria (Albert et al, 2011). However, self-awareness of cognitive impairment is highly variable in AD, including in its early stages (Leicht, Berwig, & Gertz, 2010;Orfei et al, 2010); therefore, individuals with AD in the included studies did not necessarily have SCI or had varying levels of SCI depending on study instrumentation. For the purposes of this review, inclusion of MCI or AD groups was used as an additional point of comparison with SCI groups (individuals with no objectively measured cognitive impairment).…”

“…Therefore, it is important for future research to consider the meaning of self-versus informant-reported SCI as it relates to a potential preclinical AD indicator versus a component of affective symptomatology. It has been shown that there is variability in awareness of cognitive impairment among individuals at similar AD stages (i.e., mild to moderate impairment; Leicht et al, 2010;Orfei et al, 2010;Ownsworth, Clare, & Morris, 2006). Among individuals with MCI, self-reports of cognitive problems may relate more to affective symptoms, whereas informant reports may more reliably indicate objective cognitive decline (Edmonds et al, 2014).…”

Assessing anosognosia: a critical review

“…This has been often investigated in patients in early stages of Alzheimer's Disease -AD (for a recent review see Kaszniak & Edmonds, 2010). The results indicate that over 40% of AD patients show anosognosia for their amnesia (Orfei et al, 2010b) and its presence is associated with decreased functional activation of medial prefrontal and anterior temporal areas (Zamboni et al, in press). Lack of awareness of memory deficits in dementia has also been sketched in cognitive models.…”