Epilepsy in neuropathologically verified Alzheimer's disease

Abstract

Purpose Subjects with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) have been shown to be at a higher risk for epilepsy. The vast majority of the previous studies have not included a full neuropathological examination.

Methods The objective of this study was to assess the prevalence of epilepsy and clinicopathological characteristics in a well-defined study group of 64 subjects with AD. We evaluated the clinicopathological findings in 64 subjects (mean age at death 85 ± 8.6 years) from a longitudi-nal study cohort of patients with dementia.

Results Eleven out of the 64 subjects (17%) had a history of epilepsy, which is comparable to previous studies. The subjects with AD and epilepsy were significantly younger at the time of AD diagnosis and at the time of hospitalisation. In addition, their duration of AD was longer. Concomitant neuropathology in addition to AD was common in both groups and the ApoE genotypes did not differ significantly between the groups.

Conclusion The strength of this study is a thorough neuropathological examination of all study subjects. Our findings support the previous literature regarding the prevalence of epilepsy in subjects with AD. We have shown that the subjects with AD and epilepsy differ significantly from the subjects without epilepsy.