Christopher Gabriel

Digit span: a comparison of Chinese versus alphabetic language speakers in dysexecutive dementia patients

Objective: To study the language effect in digit span performance of dysexecutive dementia patients from a multilingual society. Background: Literature raises concern of cross language discrepancies in the performance of digit span. To date, the cross language effect has not been examined among patients who suffer neurodegenerative disease from a multi-lingual society. We hypothesize that performance on the forward digit span (FDS) task is language dependent and not associated with executive function. Methods: A total of 121 Chinese and non-Chinese speaking patients (English and Malay) with dementia and executive dysfunction completed the working memory task from Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R) edition. Logistic regression was performed to identify differences in performance on this task between these two groups. Results: Chinese speakers were found to perform significantly better on the FDS when compared to non-Chinese speakers. There was no difference in performance of visual memory span between the groups. Conclusions: Consistent with pervious findings, FDS is independent of executive function. It indicates a need to validate the performance on the digit span task among different languages within a population from the same social background. Disclosure: Dr. Ting has nothing to disclose. Dr. Hameed has nothing to disclose. Dr. Tan has nothing to disclose. Dr. Gabriel has nothing to disclose. Dr. Doshi has nothing to disclose.

The validity of the singapore famous faces test in detecting cognitive impairments

We translated the test “partial knowledge of abstract words” into Thai and investigated the occurrence of partial knowledge effects in the conceptual domain of abstract words in individuals with frontotemporal dementia-semantic dementia (FTD-SD), Alzheimer disease (AD), and other dementia. Twelve FTD-SD, 14 AD, 7 non-amnestic mild cognitive impairment (non-am MCI), 3 other dementia, and 10 healthy controls were examined with 3 level synonym comprehension abstract word test. They include antonym distractors, distant distractors, and close distractors. Results: Mean scores of the antonym distractors, distant distractors, and close distractors of dementia groups and controls were displayed in figure 1. All dementia groups showed weaker performance on choosing distant distractors and close distractors, which requires a fine specification of word meaning, than controls. The impairment of partial knowledge of abstract words was greater in those with SD than AD compared to controls (SD: antonym distractor SE1⁄43.43 p1⁄40.034, distant distractors SE1⁄43.36, p1⁄40.001, close distractor SE 1⁄42.69, p1⁄40.002; AD: antonym distractor SE1⁄43.31, p1⁄40.03, distant distractors SE1⁄43.25, p1⁄40.005, close distractor SE1⁄42.6, p1⁄40.016). We found that 3 subjects with Parkinson dementia and vascular dementia performed worst. However, the number of subjects in this group was small. Conclusions: These findings demonstrate that a degraded conceptual knowledge of abstract words is a phenomenon in neurodegenerative diseases and vascular dementia. Detailed information of abstract words is more affected than broad-sense information.

PRESENTATION OF AFFECTIVE AND DISRUPTIVE CLUSTERS OF NEUROPSYCHIATRIC SYMPTOMS IN SINGAPORE

(Mean/SD) was 6.50 (5.49). According to their MADRS scores, the sample was composed of mild to moderate depressed patients. Seventy percent of the sample had late onset depression. Their mean MMSE, CAMCOG, B-ADL scores were respectively 24.90 (64.19), 81.87 (615.47) and 2.44 (61.13). The Small Volume Correction Tool (SVC) showed positive correlations between GM volumes and MMSE (Right Inferior Temporal Gyrus, p1⁄40.026, 209 voxels) and between GM volumes and CAMCOG (Right Inferior Temporal Gyrus, p1⁄40.004, 471 voxels) and Left Inferior Temporal Gyrus (p1⁄40.026, 114 voxels). No negative correlations were found. Conclusions: These findings highlight the relationship between cognitive performance and volumes of temporal structures in elderly depressed individuals. The positive correlation between MMSE and CAMCOG scores with temporal volumes specifically in elderly depressed individuals provides support to the view that at least a subtype of depression in the elderly may be a risk factor or a prodomic syndrome for AD.