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. 2012 Sep;27(6):371-80.
doi: 10.1177/1533317512454710.

Contribution of brain imaging to the understanding of gait disorders in Alzheimer's disease: a systematic review

Cédric Annweiler  1 , Olivier Beauchet, Sébastien Celle, Frédéric Roche, Thierry Annweiler, Gilles Allali, Robert Bartha, Manuel Montero-Odasso; WALK Team (Working group Angers-London for Knowledge)
Affiliations

Contribution of brain imaging to the understanding of gait disorders in Alzheimer's disease: a systematic review

Cédric Annweiler et al. Am J Alzheimers Dis Other Demen. 2012 Sep.

Abstract

Although gait disorders are common in Alzheimer's disease (AD), determining which brain structures and related lesions are specifically involved is a goal yet to be reached. Our objective was to systematically review all published data that examined associations between gait disorders and brain imaging in AD. Of 486 selected studies, 4 observational studies met the selection criteria. The number of participants ranged from 2 to 61 community dwellers (29%-100% female) with prodromal or dementia-stage AD. Quantitative gait disorders (ie, slower gait velocity explained by shorter stride length) were associated with white matter lesions, mainly in the medial frontal lobes and basal ganglia. The nigrostriatal dopamine system was unaffected. Qualitative gait disorders (ie, higher stride length variability) correlated with lower hippocampal volume and function. Gait disorders in AD could be explained by a high burden of age-related subcortical hyperintensities on the frontal-subcortical circuits (nonspecific) together with hippocampal atrophy and hypometabolism (specific).

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Flow diagram of selection of studies focusing on gait disorders and brain mapping in Alzheimer’s disease.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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