[Symptom severity and symptom progression in Alzheimer's disease-- comparison between two cases with early and late onset].

Since the first description of Alzheimer's disease rapid symptom progression and relatively severe cognitive symptoms have been frequently associated with early onset age, while slow symptom progression and relatively mild cognitive symptoms were often related to late onset age. In a longitudinal study of 90 patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease we investigated these hypotheses. We found that neither severity of cognitive symptoms nor symptom progression in Alzheimer's disease were associated with onset age. In addition, a comparison of extreme groups (group 1: less than 60 years of age; group 2: greater than 75 years of age), taken from the study sample, showed similar results with respect to the independent variables. The results of this study suggest that the interindividual variability of cognitive impairment as well as the large variation of symptom progression in Alzheimer's disease cannot be explained by onset age.