Attention deficits in Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia

International audience; Objective: To compare performance of patients with mild-moderate Alzheimer's disease (AD) & Vascular Dementia (VaD) on tests of information processing and on specific tests of selective, divided and sustained attention. Method: Patients with AD (n=75) & VaD (n=46) were recruited from a memory clinic along with dementia-free participants(n=28). They underwent specific tests of attention from the Cognitive Drug Research (CDR) battery and pen and paper tests including Colour Trails A and B and Stroop. All patients had a CT brain scan which was independently scored for white matter change/ischaemia. Results: Attention was impaired in both the AD & VaD patients. VaD patients had more impaired choice reaction times and were less accurate on a vigilance test measuring sustained attention. Deficits in selective and divided attention occurred in both patient groups and showed the strongest correlations with MMSE scores. Conclusion: This study demonstrates problems with the attentional network in mild-moderate AD and VaD. We propose attention should be tested routinely in a memory clinic setting.