A two-year follow-up study of remote memory in Alzheimer's disease.
The authors assessed long-term changes in autobiographical and public remote memory in a series of 21 patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) and 10 age-comparable healthy comparison subjects who underwent two evaluations, with an interval ranging from 24 to 36 months. The assessment consisted of the Remote and Autobiographical Memory Scales and the Buschke Selective Reminding Test. The AD group showed a significantly greater decline on both types of remote memory than the comparison group. Alzheimer's disease patients performed significantly better on recognition than on free-recall, suggesting more severe retrieval than encoding/storage deficits. The decline in anterograde verbal memory correlated significantly with the decline in autobiographical memory, suggesting a common final pathway for both deficits.
Starkstein
Sergio E
SE
Fremantle Hospital, Education Building T-7, Fremantle WA 6959, Australia. ses@cyllene.uwa.edu.au
Boller
Francois
F
Garau
Laura
L
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000503:physiopathology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001325:Autobiographies as Topic; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008569:Memory Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D012720:Severity of Illness Index