title: Cortical function in Alzheimer's disease and frontotemporal dementia.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Alzheimer's disease (AD) and the behavioral variant of frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) are the most common causes of dementia; however, their overlapping clinical syndromes and involved brain regions make a differential diagnosis difficult. We aimed to identify the differences in the cognition and motor cortex excitability between AD and bvFTD patients.
  
  
  METHODS
  Twenty-seven AD patients and 30 bvFTD patients were included in the study. Each participant received a neurological evaluation. Cognitive event-related potentials (P300) were recorded during an auditory oddball task. Next, the excitability of the motor cortex, including the resting, facilitated motor threshold (RMT and FMT) and cortical silent period (CSP), were assessed during transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).
  
  
  RESULTS
  The bvFTD patients exhibited significantly longer P300 latencies compared with AD patients. There was a significant negative correlation between cognition and P300 latency in the bvFTD group. The AD patients showed significantly reduced RMT and FMT values compared to the bvFTD group; however, no significant correlation was found between AD severity and the excitability of the motor cortex.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Cognition and motor cortical functions are different between AD and bvFTD patients. Noninvasive electrophysiological examinations have the potential to identify unique pathophysiological features that can be used to differentially diagnose AD and bvFTD patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, Tianjin, 300060, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Pan
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, Tianjin, 300060, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Huihong
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Department of electrophysiology, Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, Tianjin, 300060, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Lu
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, Tianjin, 300060, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Yuying
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhou
keywords: Alzheimer’s disease (AD); Behavioral variant of frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD); Cortical function; Event-related potentials (ERP); Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)