Neuropsychiatric symptoms in behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia and primary progressive aphasia

Abstract

Neuropsychiatric symptoms are well defined in behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia but are not as well studied in primary progressive aphasia. This study compared caregiver reported neuropsychiatric symptoms in these 2 forms of dementia at short and long disease duration. Patients with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia had more symptoms than patients with primary progressive aphasia. However, when divided by duration of disease, patients with primary progressive aphasia with long duration had a similar number of symptoms to patients with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia at either duration. Furthermore, this group of patients with primary progressive aphasia had more symptoms typical of behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia and less mood-related symptoms which were more common in patients with primary progressive aphasia with shorter duration. This study illustrates the emergence of neuropsychiatric symptoms as primary progressive aphasia progresses and highlights the increasing overlap with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia because the disease affects areas outside of the language network.

Figure 1

Percent frequency of patients with each symptom in each diagnostic group. Symptoms are divided into categories: frontal/comportmental, mood, and disruptive/psychotic. Ab indicates aberrant motor behavior; Dis = disinhibition; Apa = apathy; App = appetite and eating; Eup = euphoria; Anx = anxiety; Dep = depression; Irr = irritability; Agi = agitation; Nig = nighttime behaviors; Del = delusions; Hal = hallucinations.