Elucidation of the pathogenic mechanism and development of countermeasures of BPSD in non-Alzheimer's disease by neuroimaging analysis

2021 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K23155
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: 0908:Society medicine, nursing, and related fields
• Research Institution: Fukushima Medical University
• Principal Investigator: Sakamoto Kazutaka 福島県立医科大学, 公私立大学の部局等, 博士研究員 (00880030)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-09-11 – 2022-03-31
• Keywords: 認知症 / BPSD / Voxel-based morphometry / NPI / DBD / 病前性格

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Using Voxel-based morphometry (VBM), we aimed to elucidate the mechanism of Behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) onset in Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) and Argyrophilic grain dementia (AGD) and to develop countermeasures.
The clinical diagnosis of the subjects was Alzheimer's disease, mild cognitive impairment, DLB, dementia without cognitive dysfunction, and frontotemporal dementia. There were few DLBs and no AGD. In addition, as a result of correlation analysis using VBM for the entire subject or for each disease group, there was no brain region that correlated with either the Neuropsychiatric Inventory or the Dementia Behavior Disturbance Scale, which are evaluation scales for BPSD.

Free Research Field

老年精神医学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究の結果から、VBMとBPSDの評価尺度のみを用いた解析ではBPSDの神経基盤の解明は難しいことが示唆された。VBMとNPIを用いた先行研究の文献レビューでは、NPIの症状と脳部位との関係性について一致した見解は得られず、責任病巣も重複していた。病巣とBPSDを1対1の因果関係で説明することは必ずしも容易ではなく、患者の病前性格や心理社会的要因が強く関連しているという以前の報告を本研究は支持した。今後、病前性格等を反映した解析を行っていくことでBPSDの早期予防および有効性の高い対応法の開発につながると考えた。