Andreas Kage

In an epidemiological sample the apolipoprotein E4 allele is associated to dementia and loss of memory function only in the very old

The apolipoprotein E4 allele has been reported to be associated with late onset Alzheimers disease. Here we report the relation of several neuropsychological test parameters and the diagnosis of dementia to the apolipoprotein E polymorphism in an epidemiological sample of 477 subjects aged 70-103 years. The apolipoprotein E4 allele was found to be associated with reduced performance in several sensitive neuropsychological memory tests and with diagnosis of dementia only in the oldest subjects (> 84 years). The association with dementia in this population based sample was much weaker than previously described and became only significant in a logistic regression analysis when age was included in the model.

Age and dementia effect on neuropsychological test performance in very old age - influence of risk factors for dementia*

In old age a large part of the variance in cognitive performance in population samples is explained by normal aging; in addition many subjects over 80 years are demented and therefore dementia also explains a part of cognitive variability. The question is whether the different factors for dementia (such as ApoE4, external atrophy parameter of the cranial computer tomography [cCT], education, sex or serum zinc level) influence the relation between age or dementia and Mini Mental State (MMSE) performance. In an epidemiological study data were analyzed of N = 239 subjects for the above factors. Most statistically significant variables of the MMSE do not change the amount of the partial correlation coefficient between the parameters age or dementia and MMSE. The external atrophy, however, diminishes the magnitude of the partial correlation between age and MMSE. In contrast the dementia-MMSE relation is unchanged. This points to a generally similar factor structure of cognitive aging and dementia in old age, but differences exist with respect to the importance of the external atrophy parameter of the brain. Most factors investigated explain separate parts of variance of cognitive performance in old age.

S10.6 Glycobiology of saliva — clinical relevance of an oligosaccharide mediated host defence system

S. Teneberg ~, I. L6nnroth 2, J. Torres 3, U. Galili 4, J. /~ngstr6m ~ and K.-A. Karlsson 1 IDepartment of Medical Biochemistry, University of G6teborg, S413 90 G6teborg, Sweden; 2Department of Medical Microbiology, University of G6teborg, S-413 46 G6teborg, Sweden; 3Unidad de Investigation en Entermedades Infeceiosas, Hospital de Pediatria, CMN, IMSS, Mexico; 4Cancer Research Institute and Department of Anatomy, University o f California, San Francisco, California, USA.