Recognizing Primary Progressive Aphasia between Frontotemporal Dementia

variants: Denomination errors like a tool for differential diagnosis

Rodríguez-Suárez, N.*; Mayorga, P.**; Matallana, D.***
* Master Psychology enphase Clinic and Cognitive Neuropsychology (nathalia.rodriguez.suarez@gmail.com)
** Master Psychology enphase Clinic and Cognitive Neuropsychology (pilar.mayorgasierra@gmail.com)
*** PhD. Neuropsychology (dianamat@javeriana.edu.co)

Descriptive: the answer descrive the element, for example, owl:

Introduction:
“that bird that flies at night”, rooster: “sing int the morning, when
Frontotemporal dementia variants differentiation are a frecuent
the sun shine”.
challenge in clinical practice. The naming verbal test is an
excellent tool that led to recognize those variants patterns. Phonologic: patient replace some letter (phonological
Subjects must name each of 48 picture that are present by visual paraphasias), for example, “sneek” instead of “sneak”, “dless”
confrontation and the response pattern can provide clinic instead of “dress”.
information for early diagnosis.
Descriptive anaysis were carried out. Pictures where clasify in two
groups anímate and inanimate.
Design and Methods:
Results: Figure 2 shows results in 3 groups.
Subjects:
V
N= 42 Colombian patients: 12 with primary progressive aphasia
F
(PPA), 23 with behavioral variant (FTDbv) and 7 with semantic
dementia (SD). Sociodemographic data are shown in figure 1. VS

Sociodemographic data D

10 NR
9
8 S
7
6 0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 6.00 7.00 8.00 9.00
5 PPA Animate PPA Inanimate SD Animate
4 SD Inanimate BV Animate BV Inanimate
3
2 BV group have low rate of errors, with more VS. There is a high
1
0
rate of semantic errors in SD group but just in animate objects.
Inanimate pictures have more descriptive errors in PPA and SD
PPA BV SD
Figure 1: Study subjects
groups. Anomic errors have differential pattern y PPA and SD,
for PPA there is similar errors in animate and inanimate pictures,
Procedure: instead of more inanimate anomic errors in SD group. PPA have
not visual errors, that seems to be part of semantic deterioration.
Subjects must name each of 48 pictures. Errors were classified in Phonological errors are present in SD and PPA group but, in
the next categories (no responses were classify with NR): PPA are present in animate and inanimate pictures, SD group
Semantic: the response have some semantic relationship with the seems to be high for animate.
picture, for example, for the picture “fiddle” the response “guitar”,
Discussion
“music” or “musical instrument”.

Visual: the response have some visual similarity, for example: Studies referred by Caramazza y Mahon1 suggest brain
differential basis for animate and inanimate objects (sensory-
“Magnifying glass” “Sword” functional theory2,3,4). Animate basis seems to be related with
lateral aspect of the fusiform gyri and superior temporal sulcus.
(Tie) (Paintbrush) Inanimate basis seems to be related with inferior regions
centered on the left middle temporal gyrus. Results suggest
possible alteration in lateral aspect of the fusiform gyri and
Visual-semantic: the response have some semantic relationship superior temporal sulcus in SD group, while PPA, with high
and some visual similarity. semantic errors in animate objects, high descriptive errors in
inanimate objects, seems to suggest some relation between
“Guitar” “Rabbit” semantic damage and the verbal language alteration.
1 Caramazza, A., & Mahon, B. Z. (2003). The organization of conceptual knowledge: the evidence from category-specific semantic deficits. Trends in cognitive sciences, 7(8), 354-361.

(Fiddle) (Rat)
2 Caramazza, A., & Shelton, J. R. (1998). Domain-specific knowledge systems in the brain: The animate-inanimate distinction. Journal of cognitive neuroscience, 10(1), 1-34.
3 Sartori, G., Gnoato, F., Mariani, I., Prioni, S., & Lombardi, L. (2007). Semantic relevance, domain specificity and the sensory/functional theory of category-specificity. Neuropsychologia, 45(5), 966-976.
4 Lowder, M. W., & Gordon, P. C. (2015). Natural forces as agents: Reconceptualizing the animate–inanimate distinction. Cognition, 136, 85-90.