A comparison of the frontal variant of Alzheimer's Disease with typical Alzheimer's Disease and frontotemporal dementia

by Ninman, Erin Taylor.

A frontal variant of Alzheimer’s Disease (FvAD) has been described in the literature in which prominent frontal lobe dysfunction accompanies typical temporal and parietal lobe dysfunction in the early stages of the illness. However, no study has investigated how executive deficits and neuropsychiatric symptoms of the FvAD subgroup differ from those v seen in frontotemporal dementias. The current proposal describes a study designed to examine neuropsychological and behavioral functioning in groups of AD, FvAD and FTD patients. It is predicted that the FvAD group will have an older age of onset and a lower ratio of males to females than the FTD group, and will perform similar to the AD group on measures of memory, language and visuospatial abilities. The FvAD group is also expected to perform similar to the FTD group on measures of executive functioning and exhibit a greater degree of behavioral symptoms than the AD group. Implications of possible outcomes of the study are then discussed. vi