Dementia with Lewy bodies

Abstract

Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) is the recommended term for a common cause of dementia characterized by the histological presence of distinctive inclusions within neurons, Lewy bodies (McKeith et al, 1996). Following increasing pathological recognition, core clinical diagnostic features have been identified to allow diagnosis in life. Insights into the biology of this type of neurodegeneration suggest that the regional patterns of involvement might allow therapeutic intervention. Although Lewy bodies had long been recognized in the substantia nigra and other subcortical nuclei in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD), it was only in the 1970s that a significant number of reports began to be published from Japan describing patients with dementia and parkinsonism associated with the presence of Lewy bodies in cortical neurons (reviewed by Kosaka, 1990). Since these reports, different workers have used a variety of terms to describe this disease process, including diffuse Lewy body disease (Yoshimura, 1983), Lewy body dementia (Gibb et al, 1987), senile dementia of Lewy body type (Perry et al, 1990a) and the Lewy body variant of Alzheimer's disease (Hansen et al, 1990).