[Neuropsychologic performance and depressed mood in sporadic late onset Alzheimer disease]

Some studies suggest that the concomitance of dementia and depression can increase the patient's functional inability, being able to exacerbate cognitive deficits associated to the neurodegenerative process. However, at the moment there is not agreement in the literature about if depression contributes to increase the neuropsychologic impairment associated to Alzheimer disease.

The purpose of the present paper was to study whether the presence of symptoms of depression affects the neuropsychologic performance of patients with sporadic late onset Alzheimer disease (SLOAD) in tasks of attention/concentration, memory, language, construction and visuospatial functions, speed of motor performance, concept formation and reasoning.

In order to carry out this research a sample consisting of 58 subjects diagnosed of SLOAD was used. These subjects were distributed in two groups in function of the presence or absence of symptoms of depression, based on the punctuations obtained in the Beck Depression Inventory. The evaluation of each subject consisted of a full neurological exploration, a neuroradiologic exam by computed tomography scans, a socio demographic, clinical and neuropsychologic evaluation with a battery of tests designed for this study.

The obtained results show that the symptoms of depression doesn't influence neuropsychologic performance of SLOAD patients, what lead us to suggest that the neuropsychologic consequences of depression may be overshadowed by the influence of the neurodegenerative process.