Gesture comprehension, knowledge and production in Alzheimer’s disease

Abstract

Patients with AD can clearly show gesture apraxia from the mild-moderate stage of dementia onwards. Recognition and imitation disorders are relatively frequent (especially for pantomimes). We did not find conceptual difficulties to be the main problem in early-stage AD.

Hypertension is associated with worse cognitive function and hippocampal hypometabolism in Alzheimer's disease

“…Hypertensive patients had worse results on items testing word recognition and the ability to follow commands. Impaired verbal learning and difficulties in performing simple tasks are considered early signs of AD , thus it is possible that hypertension might be one of the earlier factors leading to the development of AD. Investigating these findings in hypertensive individuals without AD and in patients with mild cognitive impairment may shed light on this intriguing hypothesis.…”

Apraxia profile differentiates behavioural variant frontotemporal from Alzheimer's dementia in mild disease stages

“…These gestures are usually well trained and thus may be guided by semantic memory 30. It has previously been shown that patients with AD can also be impaired on these more conceptual tasks of apraxia even in early disease stages 25. Nevertheless, accuracy in tasks on pantomimes of object use is positively influenced by semantic knowledge about objects and tool use 31.…”

Bimanual Gesture Imitation Links to Cognition and Olfaction

“…As a higher‐order disorder of sensorimotor integration, apraxia is commonly seen in neurological diseases, such as Alzheimer disease (AD) and stroke, and may contribute to dementia diagnosis in early stages . Among subtypes of apraxia, ideomotor apraxia is believed to reflect an impaired action production system.…”

“…A s a higher-order disorder of sensorimotor integration, apraxia is commonly seen in neurological diseases, such as Alzheimer disease (AD) and stroke, and may contribute to dementia diagnosis in early stages. [1][2][3][4][5][6] Among subtypes of apraxia, ideomotor apraxia is believed to reflect an impaired action production system. Due to insufficient conversion to execution of motor programming, individuals with ideomotor apraxia exhibit deficits in the spatial organization, timing, and sequencing of gestural movements.…”