title: Rapidly progressing atrophy of medial temporal lobe in Alzheimer's disease.
abstract: The symptoms of Alzheimer's disease are associated with pathological change and loss of neurons in the medial temporal lobe. By yearly temporal-lobe-oriented computed tomograms the average rate of atrophy of the medial temporal lobe was 15.1% per year (95% CI 10.0, 20.2) in 20 patients with histopathologically, confirmed Alzheimer's disease and 1.5% (0.2, 2.8) in 47 healthy ageing controls. Such excessive atrophy presumably reflects the vulnerability of the medial temporal lobe to a catastrophic event, probably a pathological cascade process. Thus, Alzheimer's disease may not be due simply to an acceleration of normal ageing but, rather, is the consequence of a true disease process.
authors.affiliation: University Department of Pharmacology, Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, UK.
authors.forename: K A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Jobst
authors.forename: A D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Szatmari
authors.forename: M M
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Esiri
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Jaskowski
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Hindley
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: McDonald
authors.forename: A J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Molyneux
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology* / Q000523:psychology; D001284:Atrophy; D003071:Cognition; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology*; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed