RESUMEN
Due to the phenomenon of ageing population, cognitive impairment has become more prevalent, and any marker able to improve its detection becomes of significant importance. With that objective in mind, a prospective observational study was performed in a medical consultation related to cognitive impairment. 150 subjects (58% women) were included with an average age of 76 years (SD 8.6). The Head Turn sign was positive for 32 subjects with a sensitivity of 41.7% for dementia, a specificity of 93.7% and a negative predictive value of 64.4%. This study shows the semiologic value of a simple clinical sign, easy to spot in the daily practice and most helpful to alert physicians about a likely dementia diagnosis.
Asunto(s)
Disfunción Cognitiva , Demencia , Movimientos de la Cabeza , Anciano , Disfunción Cognitiva/diagnóstico , Demencia/diagnóstico , Femenino , Humanos , Masculino , Prevalencia , Estudios Prospectivos , Sensibilidad y EspecificidadRESUMEN
Dementia is a common illness to find in a psychiatric consultation and its incidence is rising as the aged population increases. Traditionally the imagines in dementia were used to rule out etiologies that had pharmacological o surgery treatments. However, in the last years neuroimaging has played a very important role in the field of dementia. Structural imaging (particularly MRI) has become an important tool in the diagnosis of degenerative dementias because of findings that help us to support the diagnosis of different etiologies. Different patterns of atrophy can be identified on visual inspection of MRI in various neurodegenerative conditions. However, it's sometimes difficult to recognize or acknowledge these patterns during a regular outpatient clinic visit. In this review we describe the most important findings in structural neuroimaging in the most common causes of dementia and we analyze the most useful visual scales that can help us in the differential diagnosis of dementia during a regular outpatient clinic visit.