Alzheimer Disease: Vale FA

Engelhardt E, Brucki SM, Cavalcanti JL, Forlenza OV, Laks J, Vale FA, Anonymous00032. · Setor de Neurologia Cognitiva e do Comportamento, Instituto de Neurologia Deolindo Couto, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. · Arq Neuropsiquiatr. · Pubmed #16400437 links to  free full text

Abstract: The present recommendations and suggestions on "Treatment of Alzheimer's Disease" were elaborated by a work group constituted by participants of the IV Meeting of Researchers on Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders, sponsored by the Scientific Department of Cognitive Neurology and Aging of the Brazilian Academy of Neurology. They comprise topics on pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment of cognitive impairment and functional decline, as well as of behavioral and psychological symptoms of this dementing disease. Several levels of evidence and of recommendations and suggestions are used for the various proposed drugs, as well as for non-pharmacological treatment, underpinned by a wide national and international bibliographical review.

Caramelli P, Chaves ML, Engelhardt E, Machado JC, Schultz RR, Vale FA, Charchat-Fichman H, Anonymous00245. · Department of Neurology, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, Brazil. · Arq Neuropsiquiatr. · Pubmed #15273830 links to  free full text

Abstract: OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effects of galantamine on the performance of patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease (AD) in a computerized neuropsychological test battery (CNTB). METHOD: Thirty-three patients with probable AD were treated with galantamine for three months and evaluated in a prospective, open-label, multi-center study. The CNTB and the ADAS-Cog were administered at baseline and after 12 weeks. The CNTB includes reaction time tests to evaluate attention, implicit and episodic memory for faces and words. Statistical comparisons were performed between the results in week 12 versus baseline. Patients who did not reach the therapeutic doses were excluded from the efficacy analysis. RESULTS: Four patients (12.1%) were excluded from the analysis either because of treatment discontinuation (n=3) or because a therapeutic dose was not reached (n=1). The remaining 29 patients were treated with doses of 24 mg/day (n=22) and 16 mg/day (n=7). After 12 weeks, significant reductions in reaction time were seen in the test of episodic memory for faces (p=0.023) and in the test of two-choice reaction time (p=0.039) of the CNTB. CONCLUSION: Treatment with galantamine produced improvement in computerized tests of attention and episodic memory after 12 weeks, leading to statistically significant reduction in the reaction times.