Diagnosis of Alzheimer's Disease in Clinical Practice: Time to Incorporate Biomarkers?

Hippocampal dysfunction is associated with early clinical signs of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Due to the limited availability or invasiveness of current biomarkers, the AD diagnosis is usually based on cognitive assessment and structural brain imaging. The recent study by Lalive and colleagues examined the specificity of brain morphometry for the AD diagnosis in a memory clinic cohort with hippocampal-type amnestic syndrome.

Spatial navigation questionnaires as a supportive diagnostic tool in early Alzheimer's disease.

Impaired spatial navigation is early marker of Alzheimer's disease (AD). We examined ability of self- and informant-reported navigation questionnaires to discriminate between clinically and biomarker-defined participants, and associations of questionnaires with navigation performance, regional brain atrophy, AD biomarkers, and biomarker status. 262 participants (cognitively normal, with subjective cognitive decline, amnestic mild cognitive impairment [aMCI], and mild dementia) and their informants completed three navigation questionnaires.

Evaluation of Differential Diagnostics Potential of Uniform Data Set 2 Neuropsychology Battery Using Alzheimer's Disease Biomarkers.

Objective: This study aims to evaluate the efficacy of the Uniform Data Set (UDS) 2 battery in distinguishing between individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) attributable to Alzheimer's disease (MCI-AD) and those with MCI due to other causes (MCI-nonAD), based on contemporary AT(N) biomarker criteria. Despite the implementation of the novel UDS 3 battery, the UDS 2 battery is still used in several non-English-speaking countries.

Methods: We employed a cross-sectional design.

Mild behavioral impairment in early Alzheimer's disease and its association with APOE and BDNF risk genetic polymorphisms.

Background: Mild behavioral impairment (MBI) has been commonly reported in early Alzheimer's disease (AD) but rarely using biomarker-defined samples. It is also unclear whether genetic polymorphisms influence MBI in such individuals. We thus aimed to examine the association between the cognitive status of participants (amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI-AD) vs cognitively normal (CN) older adults) and MBI severity.