[The neuropsychological profile of mild cognitive impairment with involvement of multiple cognitive areas. The importance of amnesia in distinguishing two subtypes of patients].

INTRODUCTION

The use of diagnostic criteria for mild cognitive impairment (MCI) that do not require the presence of amnesia enables patients to be classified into three types of MCI: pure amnestic MCI (aMCI), MCI with involvement of multiple cognitive functions and amnesia (mf-aMCI) and MCI with involvement of multiple cognitive functions without amnesia, or non-amnestic MCI (mf-nonaMCI).

AIM

To determine whether patients with MCI with involvement of multiple functions (mfMCI) have a different profile of cognitive involvement depending on whether amnesia is present or not.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

Out of a total sample of 175 patients with MCI, we studied 138 with mfMCI. Of these, 109 (79%) had memory disorders (mf-aMCI) and 29 (21%) did not (mf-nonaMCI). For each group of patients, we determined the percentage who scored below normal in each of the items on the abbreviated Barcelona test.

RESULTS

Patients with mf-aMCI failed more frequently in temporal orientation, naming and semantic category evocation tests. Patients with mf-nonaMCI failed more often in motor praxis and abstraction tests. Differences were statistically significant. Additionally, it was noted that patients with mf-nonaMCI tended to make more mistakes in attention tests.

CONCLUSIONS

The presence of amnesia allows us to identify an mf-aMCI group with a cognitive profile suggesting temporal involvement, unlike the mf-nonaMCI group, whose members have a cognitive profile that suggests subcortical compromise.