Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience (May 2021)

Mild Behavioral Impairment Is Associated With Atrophy of Entorhinal Cortex and Hippocampus in a Memory Clinic Cohort

  • Veronika Matuskova,
  • Veronika Matuskova,
  • Zahinoor Ismail,
  • Zahinoor Ismail,
  • Zahinoor Ismail,
  • Zahinoor Ismail,
  • Tomas Nikolai,
  • Tomas Nikolai,
  • Hana Markova,
  • Hana Markova,
  • Katerina Cechova,
  • Katerina Cechova,
  • Zuzana Nedelska,
  • Zuzana Nedelska,
  • Jan Laczó,
  • Jan Laczó,
  • Meng Wang,
  • Meng Wang,
  • Jakub Hort,
  • Jakub Hort,
  • Martin Vyhnalek,
  • Martin Vyhnalek

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2021.643271
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 13

Abstract

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ObjectivesMild behavioral impairment (MBI) is a syndrome describing late-onset persistent neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in non-demented older adults. Few studies to date have investigated the associations of MBI with structural brain changes. Our aim was to explore structural correlates of NPS in a non-demented memory clinic sample using the Mild Behavioral Impairment Checklist (MBI-C) that has been developed to measure MBI.MethodsOne hundred sixteen non-demented older adults from the Czech Brain Aging Study with subjective cognitive concerns were classified as subjective cognitive decline (n = 37) or mild cognitive impairment (n = 79). Participants underwent neurological and neuropsychological examinations and brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) (1.5 T). The Czech version of the MBI-C was administered to participants’ informants. Five a priori selected brain regions were measured, namely, thicknesses of the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), and entorhinal cortex (ERC) and volume of the hippocampus (HV), and correlated with MBI-C total and domain scores.ResultsEntorhinal cortex was associated with MBI-C total score (rS = −0.368, p < 0.001) and with impulse dyscontrol score (rS = −0.284, p = 0.002). HV was associated with decreased motivation (rS = −0.248, p = 0.008) and impulse dyscontrol score (rS = −0.240, p = 0.011).ConclusionNeuropsychiatric symptoms, particularly in the MBI impulse dyscontrol and motivation domains, are associated with medial temporal lobe atrophy in a clinical cohort of non-demented older adults. This study supports earlier involvement of temporal rather than frontal regions in NPS manifestation. Since these regions are typically affected early in the course of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), the MBI-C may potentially help further identify individuals at-risk of developing AD dementia.

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