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Dementia

Apathetic Patients May Have Smaller Brains

Apathy, a lack of interest or emotion, may be a signal of underlying brain changes in older adults, according to a new study.

In order to investigate the relationship between apathy, specifically in older adults without depression, and structural brain changes, researchers from the National Institute on Aging at the National Institute of Health followed 4354 participants in the Gene/Environment Susceptibility-Reykjavik Study. 

Average age of participants was 76 years old, and none of the participants had diagnosed dementia.
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Participants underwent MRI scans to measure their brain volume, and answered 3 items from the 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale measuring apathy symptoms, including loss of interest or emotion, lack of energy, and preferring to stay at home.   

Overall, participants with 2 or more apathy symptoms showed a 1.4% smaller gray matter volume and 1.6% less white matter than those with less than 2 symptoms of apathy.  Loss of brain volume occurred particularly in the frontal and temporal lobes and in the parietal lobe.  Those with apathy were also more likely to have white matter lesions in the frontal lobe. 

“The fact that participants in our study had apathy without depression should turn our attention to how apathy alone could indicate brain disease,” researchers concluded.

“If these findings are confirmed, identifying people with apathy earlier may be one way to target an at-risk group.”

–Michael Potts

 

Grool AM, Geerlings MI, Sgurdsson S, Eirksdottir G, et al. Structural MRI correlates of apathy symptoms in older persons without dementia [Published online before print April 16, 2014] Neurology. doi: 10.1212/WNL.0000000000000378