Abstract Details

Title Cognitive Screening Subscores and Cortical Thickness in Amnestic and Non-Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment

Topic Aging, Dementia, and Behavioral Neurology

Presentation(s) P10 - Poster Session 10 (8:00 AM-9:00 AM)

Poster/Presentation
Number 3-001

Background Amnestic (aMCI) and non-amnestic MCI (naMCI) are commonly associated with different underlying pathologies (e.g., Alzheimer’s disease versus bvFTD). Most cognitive screening tools do not differentiate these subgroups and instead focus on the presence or absence of impairment. The potential for subscores of cognitive screenings to identify reduced cortical thickness of regions with known associations to cognitive domains (e.g., language, memory) represents a gap in the literature, and an opportunity for greater clinical utility of cognitive screening tools.

Objective Investigate the relationship of a common cognitive screening measure with cortical thickness of associated regions of interest

Design/Methods Participants from a memory clinic research repository were classified into aMCI (n=164) and naMCI (n=34). Cognitive domain subscores were derived from tasks of the MoCA (e.g., executive, memory) and associated with cortical thickness within functional networks (Yeo et al., 2011).

Results

Total hippocampal volume and default mode network cortical thickness (DMNct) measures correlated significantly with total MoCA score (r=.354, p>.001; r=.252, p>.001), MoCA Memory Index Score (MIS; r=.451, p>.001; r=.290, p>.001), and Delayed Recall subscore (r=.398, p>.001; r=.281, p>.001) in aMCI but not naMCI (p’s>.05). Executive/visuospatial subscore correlated significantly with DMNct (r=.179, p=.027) in aMCI, but not naMCI (p’s>.05). In the naMCI group, limbic network cortical thickness correlated significantly with total MoCA score (r=-.387 p=.015), executive/visuospatial (r=-.343 p=.035), and abstraction (r=-.355 p=.029). A linear regression model demonstrated that MoCA subscores of delayed recall and executive/visuospatial subscores predicted DMNctin the aMCI subgroup (R2 =.10, F(1,116)=16.765, p<.001).

Conclusions Cognitive domain subscores of the MoCA demonstrated different relationships in aMCI versus naMCI. These subscores may be a useful tool in distinguishing aMCI from naMCI in clinical samples, and further studies with detailed pathological classification and longitudinal assessment of progression to dementia subtypes are warranted.

Authors/Disclosures
Carolyn Parsey, PhD (CommonSpirit St Anthony North Hospital) PRESENTER	Dr. Parsey has received research support from NIH/NINDS. Dr. Parsey has received research support from Ellison Foundation.
	No disclosure on file
	No disclosure on file
	No disclosure on file
Thomas J. Grabowski, MD (University of Washington)	The institution of Dr. Grabowski has received research support from NIH.