Altered N100-potential associates with working memory impairment in Parkinson's disease

The diagnosis of cognitive impairment and dementia often occurring with Parkinson's disease (PD) is still based on the clinical picture and neuropsychological examination. Ancillary methods to detect cognitive decline in these patients are, therefore, needed. Alterations in the latencies and amplitudes of evoked response potential (ERP) components N100 and P200 have been described in PD. Due to limited number of studies their relation to cognitive deficits in PD remains obscure. The present study was designed to examine if alterations in the N100- and P200-potentials associate with neuropsychological impairment in PD. EEG-ERP was conducted to 18 PD patients and 24 healthy controls. The patients underwent a thorough neuropsychological evaluation. The controls were screened for cognitive impairment with Consortium to Establish Alzheimer's disease (CERAD)-testing and a normal result were required to be included in the study. The N100-latency was prolonged in the patients compared to the controls (p = 0.05). In the patients, the N100 latency correlated significantly with a visual working memory task (p = 0.01). Also N100 latency was prolonged and N100 amplitude habituation diminished in the patients achieving poorly in this task. We conclude that prolonged N100-latency and diminished amplitude habituation associate with visual working memory impairment in PD.