Butter C M, Trobe J D, Foster N L, Berent S
Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA.
Am J Ophthalmol. 1996 Jul;122(1):97-105. doi: 10.1016/s0002-9394(14)71969-5.
To determine whether the visual symptoms of patients with Alzheimer's disease are related to visual-spatial dysfunction.
We administered a test battery modified from existing neuropsychometric materials that taxed visual-spatial skills, form identification, color vision, and visual memory. We tested 14 patients with Alzheimer's disease who had visual symptoms prominent enough to prompt ophthalmologic consultation, 11 patients with Alzheimer's disease who lacked such visual symptoms, and a control group of 53 subjects without Alzheimer's disease. The groups with Alzheimer's disease were matched for Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised scores.
Patients with Alzheimer's disease who had prominent visual symptoms differed significantly from those without prominent visual symptoms only in their relatively poor visual-spatial test scores.
Visual symptoms in Alzheimer's disease are related primarily to visual-spatial deficits. These findings are consistent with previous evidence that patients with Alzheimer's disease who have prominent visual symptoms have accentuated histologic and metabolic abnormalities in the parieto-occipital regions known to process visual-spatial information. The findings support the view that pathways mediating visual-spatial and form identification are at least partially segregated in the brain, and emphasize that tests used to screen visually symptomatic patients with Alzheimer's disease will be more effective if they prominently assess visual-spatial skills.
确定阿尔茨海默病患者的视觉症状是否与视觉空间功能障碍有关。
我们采用了一套经过修改的测试组合，该组合源自现有的神经心理测量材料，用于测试视觉空间技能、形状识别、色觉和视觉记忆。我们对14名有明显视觉症状且已前往眼科咨询的阿尔茨海默病患者、11名无此类视觉症状的阿尔茨海默病患者以及53名无阿尔茨海默病的对照组受试者进行了测试。阿尔茨海默病组在韦氏成人智力量表修订版得分上进行了匹配。
有明显视觉症状的阿尔茨海默病患者与无明显视觉症状的患者相比，仅在视觉空间测试得分相对较低方面存在显著差异。
阿尔茨海默病中的视觉症状主要与视觉空间缺陷有关。这些发现与先前的证据一致，即有明显视觉症状的阿尔茨海默病患者在已知处理视觉空间信息的顶枕区域存在更明显的组织学和代谢异常。这些发现支持了介导视觉空间和形状识别的通路在大脑中至少部分分离的观点，并强调如果用于筛查有视觉症状的阿尔茨海默病患者的测试能突出评估视觉空间技能，将会更有效。
