A team of international researchers, led by UC San Francisco, has completed the first large-scale study of posterior cortical atrophy, a baffling constellation of visuospatial symptoms that present as the first symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease. These symptoms occur in up to 10% of cases of Alzheimer’s disease.
The study includes data from more than 1,000 patients at 36 sites in 16 countries. It publishes in the Lancet Neurology on Jan. 22, 2024.
Posterior cortical atrophy (PCA) overwhelmingly predicts Alzheimer’s, the researchers found. Some 94% of the PCA patients had Alzheimer’s pathology and the remaining 6% had conditions like Lewy body disease and frontotemporal lobar degeneration. In contrast, other studies show that 70% of patients with memory loss have Alzheimer’s pathology.
Unlike memory issues, patients with PCA struggle with judging distances, distinguishing between moving…
