Dementia in schizophrenia. Magnetic resonance and clinical correlates

Thirty-nine patients with a chronic schizophrenic disorder and 29 healthy control subjects were examined by means of multiplanar magnetic resonance imaging. Schizophrenics as a group showed increased ventricular brain ratio and reduced corpus callosum area. When patients were grouped according to their performance on the Luria-Nebraska Neuropsychological Battery (LNNB), a distinct subgroup of six patients emerged. These patients failed to perform neuropsychological testing, due to their inability to fulfill the instructions, despite often repeated full explanations of the test procedures; four of these patients had enlarged lateral ventricles and all met operational criteria for Kraepelin's dementia praecox. Two other patients subgroups were categorized as LNNB normal and abnormal. These two subgroups showed lesser brain abnormalities and lower negative symptom scores than the former.