Spatial disorientation and executive dysfunction in elderly nondemented patients with Parkinson’s disease

Abstract

ObjectivesPatients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) present with a wide range of cognitive deficits. Cognitive impairment is recognized as an independent nonmotor aspect of the disorder and has a critical role in functional outcome and conversion into PD dementia. To date, everyday memory impairment in elderly patients with PD is underinvestigated and its relationship with executive dysfunction was not clearly explained. Our study aims at clarifying the neuropsychological pattern of everyday memory and executive deterioration in elderly patients with PD.MethodsForty nondemented PD patients (mean age 71.2 years; M:F = 29:11) and 30 well-matched controls (mean age 70.7 years; M:F = 15:15) were assessed on everyday memory (Rivermead Behavioral Memory Test [RBMT]) and executive functioning (Frontal Assessment Battery [FAB]) measures. Mann–Whitney U-tests (Bonferroni corrected) were used to compare groups on these measures and Spearman’s rank correlations were performed to highlight their associations.ResultsPD patients performed worse than controls on recall for novel tasks and geographic recall (RMBT) as well as lexical fluency and mental flexibility (FAB). Particularly, spatial orientation depending on egocentric navigation seems to be altered in PD patients. The clinical group showed poorer performances than controls in mental flexibility, sensitivity to interference, and inhibitory control. Such measures were associated with immediate and delayed recall, picture recognition, prospective memory, and orientation tasks of everyday memory.ConclusionExecutive-type difficulties and memory-type difficulties have an impact on cognitive performances of elderly patients with PD. We recommend using the RBMT and the FAB as part of routinely neuropsychological battery for assessing PD patients.

Parkinson’s Disease–Mild Cognitive Impairment (PD-MCI): A Useful Summary of Update Knowledge

“…Lastly, the MDS Study group (Hoogland et al, 2019) concluded that Level I PD-MCI criteria classification also confers an independent contribution to the hazard of PDD while taking age, sex, education, motor sign severity, and depression into account, supporting its feasibility for neuropsychological diagnosis. With MDS Level II criteria, multiple domain impairment was more frequent than single-domain impairment, with predominant executive functioning, memory, and visuospatial deficits (Litvan et al, 2012; Cammisuli and Crowe, 2018). Furthermore, PD–Cognitive Rating Scale and Mattis Dementia Rating Scale-2 have been identified as suitable tests for distinguishing PD-MCI patients from cognitively normal PD patients (Koevoets et al, 2018).…”

Investigating the relationship between the SNCA gene and cognitive abilities in idiopathic Parkinson’s disease using machine learning

“…Deficits in the attention, visuo-spatial, and memory domains are frequently reported in PD-MCI patients 3 , 66 , 67 . Association of rs894280 with impairments in these domains in idiopathic PD patients may indicate a role for this variant in the development of such deficits.…”

Vitamin K Concentration and Cognitive Status in Elderly Patients on Anticoagulant Therapy: A Pilot Study

“…MMSE, however, has a significantly low sensitivity in identifying Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) [22]. erefore, we decided to use the Milan Overall Dementia Assessment (MODA) [22][23][24][25].…”

“…Values between 80 and 85 are considered borderline. Even if some authors quote MODA score up to one decimal place [22,24,25], we took the error on the MODA to be ±1.…”