title: Abnormalities in rCBF and computed tomography in patients with Alzheimer's disease and in controls.
abstract: The pattern of abnormal distribution of the single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) cerebral blood flow tracer 99m-technetium-hexamethylpropyleneamine oxime (99Tcm-HMPAO) was investigated in 14 patients with clinically diagnosed Alzheimer's disease (AD) who subsequently had post-mortem confirmation of the disease and also in 14 elderly control subjects. These abnormalities were compared with computed tomography (CT) scans to investigate the degree to which the focal SPECT deficits were due to atrophy. The results show that SPECT imaging with 99Tcm-HMPAO and CT scanning both have a higher incidence of abnormality in AD patients than in controls and that the difference between patients and controls is greater with SPECT than with CT. Frontal SPECT and CT abnormalities in moderate/severe Alzheimer's disease occur as frequently as temporal/occipital abnormalities but the latter are rare in control subjects. Around 50% of the SPECT deficits occur in CT normal brain regions, showing that atrophy is not the sole cause of SPECT deficits.
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical Physics, Southern General Hospital, Glasgow, UK.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Wyper
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Teasdale
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Patterson
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Montaldi
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Hunter
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Graham
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: McCulloch
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001921:Brain / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D002560:Cerebrovascular Circulation / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D015609:Organotechnetium Compounds; D010091:Oximes; D019690:Technetium Tc 99m Exametazime; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed
chemical_list: D015609:Organotechnetium Compounds; D010091:Oximes; D019690:Technetium Tc 99m Exametazime