A study of semantic memory after brain injury: Learning newly coined French words

AbstractObjectiveTo investigate semantic memory in brain-injured patients.MethodsWe used the new word questionnaire (QMN) to assess the ability of 12 brain-injured patients and 12 healthy controls to define French words, which had been admitted to the dictionary in 1996 to 1997 or in 2006 to 2007.ResultsDespite amnesia or severe executive disorders, the brain-injured patients were able to learn new words and remember those that they already learnt. They successfully selected the relevant phrase in which the new word was placed and were reasonably good at recognizing the right definition from among decoys. In contrast, they had trouble defining the words and compensated for this by giving examples. These problems were correlated with their vocabulary and executive function scores in a battery of neuropsychological tests.ConclusionOur results suggest that frontal injury leads to an impairment in accurate word selection and the scheduling abilities required to generate word definitions

Le TOP 12 : comment interpréter les réponses comme des mesures de la capacité de la mémoire collective ?

International audienceIntroduction. Le TOP 12 évalue la mémoire collective au travers d'une série de huit types de questions portant sur le souvenir de la vie de 12 célébrités nommément désignées. La validation de tels tests est souvent envisagée dans le seul but de prédire un critère externe au test (validation externe) ; la validation interne n'est quant à elle que très rarement étudiée. Objectifs. Montrer comment les réponses obtenues peuvent mesurer une seule grandeur hypothétique (appelée aussi construit) : la capacité de la mémoire collective. Méthodes. L'échantillon est composé de 145 sujets (91 témoins, 32 patients présentant une maladie d'Alzheimer, 21 patients ayant un trouble cognitif léger de type amnésique, 1 patient ayant une démence sémantique). Deux étapes sont nécessaires : modéliser les réponses aux items à l'aide d'un modèle de réponse à l'item à trois paramètres et tester l'unidimensionnalité des scores estimés. Résultats. Les huit modèles s'ajustent étroitement aux données. L'analyse factorielle confirmatoire ne permet pas de rejeter l'idée selon laquelle les huit types de questions mesurent bien une seule et unique grandeur hypothétique. Conclusion. La modélisation psychométrique des données observées avec le TOP 12 indique qu'elles mesurent la capacité de la mémoire collective. Mots clés : mémoire collective * TOP 12 * validation interne * modélisation psychométrique * grandeur hypothétiqu

A Subjetividade do Bem-Estar em Saúde

In this paper we will illustrate the accessibility to a subjective state of well-being from two clinical situations. We will observe how these two patients, one suffered a stroke and one displaying a neurodegenerative disease, were able to overcome their handicap and deploy their creative potential, past the psychometric assessment phase.Dans cet article nous illustrerons l’accessibilité à un état subjectif à partir de deux situations cliniques. Nous observerons comment ces deux patients, l’un présentant accident cérébral vasculaire et l’autre, une pathologie neurodégénérative ont pu surpasser leur handicap et déployer leur potentiel créatif, passée la phase d’évaluation psychométrique.Neste artigo, ilustraremos o acesso a um estado subjetivo de bem-estar, a partir de dois casos clínicos. Observaremos como esses dois pacientes, um que sofreu um derrame e outro que apresentava uma doença neurodegenerativa, foram capazes de superar sua deficiência e implementar seu potencial criativo, passada a fase de avaliação psicométrica

Le TOP 12 : comment s'en servir pour repérer une pathologie du vieillissement cognitif ?

International audienceIntroduction. Le TOP 12 examine la mémoire collective simplement et rapidement par huit types de question portant sur le souvenir de la vie de 12 célébrités nommément désignées. Objectifs. Vérifier la corrélation entre les scores moyens et le degré de sévérité de la pathologie ; déterminer un seuil permettant de conjecturer sur l'état de la personne au vu de son score au test. Méthodes. L'échantillon est composé de 145 sujets (91 témoins, 32 patients présentant une maladie d'Alzheimer, 21 patients ayant un trouble cognitif léger de type amnésique ou MCIa, 1 patient ayant une démence sémantique). Les propriétés diagnostiques du TOP 12 ont pu être mises en avant en confrontant deux méthodologies : le centilage et la courbe Receiver Operator Characteristic (ROC). Résultats. L'ordre des moyennes et l'ordre des niveaux de gravité pathologique des groupes sont corrélés. Le seuil qui optimise le compromis entre la sensibilité (Se) et la spécificité (Sp) est donné par la méthodologie de la courbe ROC (83 points ; Se = 0,83 ; Sp = 0,70). Le cinquième centile s'avère non optimal étant donné qu'il majore les omissions. Conclusion. Cette validation externe du TOP 12 montre l'intérêt de la méthodologie de la courbe ROC. Mots clés : mémoire collective * TOP 12 * propriétés diagnostiques * centilage * courbe RO

Clinical characteristics and brain PET findings in 3 cases of dissociative amnesia : Disproportionate retrograde devicit and posterior middle temporal gyrus hypometabolism

Background Precipitated by psychological stress, dissociative amnesia occurs in the absence of identifiable brain damage. Its clinical characteristics and functional neural basis are still a matter of controversy. Methods In the present paper, we report 3 cases of retrograde autobiographical amnesia, characterized by an acute onset concomitant with emotional/neurological precipitants. We present 2 cases of dissociative amnesia with fugue (cases 1 and 2), and one case of focal dissociative amnesia after a minor head trauma (case 3). The individual case histories and neuropsychological characteristics are reported, as well as the whole-brain voxel-based 18FDG-PET metabolic findings obtained at group-level in comparison to 15 healthy subjects. Results All patients suffered from autobiographical memory loss, in the absence of structural lesion. They had no significant impairment of anterograde memory or of executive function. Impairment of autobiographical memory was complete for two of the three patients, with loss of personal identity (cases 1 and 2). A clinical recovery was found for the two patients in whom follow-up was available (cases 2 and 3). Voxel-based group analysis highlighted a metabolic impairment of the right posterior middle temporal gyrus. 18FDG-PET was repeated in case 3, and showed a complete functional brain recovery. Conclusion The situation of dissociative amnesia with disproportionate retrograde amnesia is clinically heterogeneous between individuals. Our findings may suggest that impairment of high-level integration of visual and/or emotional information processing involving dysfunction of the right posterior middle temporal gyrus could reduce triggering of multi-modal visual memory traces, thus impeding reactivation of aversive memories

Social cognition deficits: the key to discriminate behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia from Alzheimer’s disease regardless of amnesia?

Relative sparing of episodic memory is a diagnostic criterion of behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD). However, increasing evidence suggests that bvFTD patients can show episodic memory deficits at a similar level as Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Social cognition tasks have been proposed to distinguish bvFTD, but no study to date has explored the utility of such tasks for the diagnosis of amnestic bvFTD. Here, we contrasted social cognition performance of amnestic and non-amnestic bvFTD from AD, with a subgroup having confirmed in vivo pathology markers. Ninety-six participants (38 bvFTD and 28 AD patients as well as 30 controls) performed the short Social-cognition and Emotional Assessment (mini-SEA). BvFTD patients were divided into amnestic versus non-amnestic presentation using the validated Free and Cued Selective Reminding Test (FCSRT) assessing episodic memory. As expected, the accuracy of the FCSRT to distinguish the overall bvFTD group from AD was low (69.7% ) with ∼50% of bvFTD patients being amnestic. By contrast, the diagnostic accuracy of the mini-SEA was high (87.9% ). When bvFTD patients were split on the level of amnesia, mini-SEA diagnostic accuracy remained high (85.1% ) for amnestic bvFTD versus AD and increased to very high (93.9% ) for non-amnestic bvFTD versus AD. Social cognition deficits can distinguish bvFTD and AD regardless of amnesia to a high degree and provide a simple way to distinguish both diseases at presentation. These findings have clear implications for the diagnostic criteria of bvFTD. They suggest that the emphasis should be on social cognition deficits with episodic memory deficits not being a helpful diagnostic criterion in bvFTD

So Close Yet So Far: Executive contribution to memory processing in behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia

Background: Memory impairment in behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) is traditionally considered to be mild and attributed to prefrontal cortex dysfunction. Recent studies, however, indicated that some patients can present with a memory impairment of the hippocampal type, showing storage and consolidation deficits in addition to the more executive/prefrontal related encoding and strategic difficulties. Objective: This study aimed to study the relationship between executive functions (EF) and memory processes in bvFTD via a data-driven approach. Method: Participants consisted of 71 bvFTD (among which 60.6% had a lumbar puncture showing non-Alzheimer biomarker profile) and 60 controls (among which 45% had amyloid imaging showing a normal profile). EF were assessed by the Frontal Assessment Battery, semantic/lexical verbal fluency tests, and forward/backward digit spans. Patients were split into amnestic (n = 33) and non-amnestic (n = 38) subgroups based on normative data (total recall score) from the Free and Cued Selective Reminding Test (FCSRT). Relationships between FCSRT subscores and EF measures were explored through hierarchical clustering analysis, partial correlation analysis with an EF component, and automated linear modeling. Results: Convergent findings across the statistical approaches show that, overall, memory performance was independent from EF in bvFTD whereas the relationship was stronger in controls. Indeed, in bvFTD, memory performance did not cluster with EF, was not correlated with the EF component, and was only partially (4% – 12.7%) predicted by EF. Discussion: These findings show that executive dysfunctions cannot solely explain the memory deficits occurring in bvFTD. Indeed, some patients present with a genuine amnesia affecting storage and consolidation abilities, which are independent from executive dysfunctions. On the clinical level, this study highlights the importance of revising the neuropsychological diagnosis criteria for bvFTD