[Memory changes in Parkinson's disease. Relation with clinical variables]

We studied verbal and visual short term memory, learning capabilities and long term retention in a sample of 96 patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD) and 42 controls matched by sex, age, years of education and verbal intelligence. We found significant differences between groups in visual short term memory and verbal learning, but not in verbal short term memory and long term retention. Performance in visual short term memory and learning correlated with the severity of disease and motor performance. Forty-one per cent of patients had impairment in visual short term memory, and this impairment is related with bradykinesia and correlated with age of onset. These results suggest that two forms of memory failure are closely related to motor symptoms and other clinical variables probably reflecting the same neuropathological substrate.