title: Impaired attention function based on the Montréal Cognitive Assessment in vascular dementia patients with frontal hypoperfusion: The Osaki-Tajiri project.
abstract: We previously reported that the Montréal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) was effective in the evaluation of cerebrovascular diseases. We also demonstrated that the test was effective for screening for very mild vascular dementia (VaD) in the community. Herein, we examined the effectiveness of MoCA in the assessment of patients with VaD in an outpatient clinic. Forty-four patients with VaD (National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke-Association Internationale pour la Recherche et l'Enseignement en Neurosciences [NINDS-AIREN] criteria) and 58 patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) (National Institute of Neurological and Communicative Disorders and Stroke-Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders Association [NINCDS-ADRDA] criteria) were compared with 67 non-demented control subjects. All were outpatients at the Tajiri Memory Clinic, Osaki-Tajiri, northern Japan. All underwent 1.5 Tesla MRI and ethyl cysteinate dimer (ECD) single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) examinations. The SPECT images were used to classify the VaD patients into two subgroups, those with frontal hypoperfusion (F-VaD) and those without frontal hypoperfusion. The frontal hypoperfusion pattern was defined as the "P2" pattern of the Sliverman classification, with or without focal hypometabolism in other areas, based on the agreement of three neurologists who were blinded to the results of the neuropsychological examinations. Total scores and attention subscores on the MoCA were lower in the F-VaD group compared with other groups. Our results suggest that the MoCA attention subscale can detect VaD participants, particularly those with frontal hypoperfusion.
authors.affiliation: Division of Geriatric Behavioral Neurology, CYRIC, Tohoku University, 4-1, Seiryo-machi, Aoba-ku, IDAC, 980-8575 Sendai, Japan.
authors.forename: Kyoko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Akanuma
authors.affiliation: Division of Geriatric Behavioral Neurology, CYRIC, Tohoku University, 4-1, Seiryo-machi, Aoba-ku, IDAC, 980-8575 Sendai, Japan. Electronic address: k-meg@umin.ac.jp.
authors.forename: Kenichi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Meguro
authors.affiliation: Division of Geriatric Behavioral Neurology, CYRIC, Tohoku University, 4-1, Seiryo-machi, Aoba-ku, IDAC, 980-8575 Sendai, Japan.
authors.forename: Yuriko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kato
authors.affiliation: Division of Geriatric Behavioral Neurology, CYRIC, Tohoku University, 4-1, Seiryo-machi, Aoba-ku, IDAC, 980-8575 Sendai, Japan.
authors.forename: Yumi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Takahashi
authors.affiliation: Division of Geriatric Behavioral Neurology, CYRIC, Tohoku University, 4-1, Seiryo-machi, Aoba-ku, IDAC, 980-8575 Sendai, Japan.
authors.forename: Kei
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Nakamura
authors.affiliation: Division of Geriatric Behavioral Neurology, CYRIC, Tohoku University, 4-1, Seiryo-machi, Aoba-ku, IDAC, 980-8575 Sendai, Japan.
authors.forename: Satoshi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yamaguchi
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D003071:Cognition; D015140:Dementia, Vascular / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon
keywords: Frontal lobe; MoCA; SPECT; Vascular dementia