Functional profile of patients with Early Frontotemporal Dementia and its relation with Executive Functions

JULIETA CAMINO; EZEQUIEL GLEICHGERRCHT; MARÍA LUZ DI GIACOMO; TERESA TORRALVA; MARÍA ROCA; MARÍA ÁNGELES POSE; FACUNDO MANES

Toronto

Encuentro; 62nd AAN 2010 Annual Meeting; 2010

American Academy of Neurology

OBJECTIVE: To determine the functional profile of patients with early Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD) and analyze the relationship between functional impairment and executive performance. BACKGROUND: The assessment of functionality is essential for the diagnosis of dementia. In FTD, functional performance has been studied in the later stages of the disease, but the functional impact observed in patients with early diagnosis of FTD has yet to be researched. Similarly, little is known about the relationship between functionality and cognitive performance, especially on executive function tasks.DESIGN/METHODS: Patients with early (CDR 0.5 or 1) diagnosis of FTD (both behavioral variant and APP) were assessed with a classical battery of executive functions. Their relatives completed the Activities of Daily Living Questionnaire in Spanish (ADLQ-SV), which has been recently validated by our group (Gleichgerrcht & Camino, et al., 2009). We determined the functional domains that showed the most severe impairments, as measured by the ADLQ-SV, and their relation with executive performance. RESULTS: The most severe mean deficits were found for Travel (49.2%), Housekeeping (47.6%) and Shopping and Money (44.4%). There was an inverse significant correlation between the number of words generated on phonological verbal fluency and the Travel (r = -0.43, p = 0.42) and Shopping and Money categories, as well as between the number of categories on the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the Travel subdomain (r = -0.56, p = 0.03). CONCLUSIONS/RELEVANCE: Patients with early FTD mainly exhibit impairment on instrumental activities of daily living, which seem to be related to their dysexecutive profile.