Interdisciplinary neuroscientific early detection and differential diagnosis of dementia
Collaboration of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, the Department of Nuclear Medicine, the Department of Neurology, and the Department of Neuroradiology.
Due to demographic changes and an aging population, the prevalence and relevance of dementia will continue to increase in the future. To distinguish between various underlying diseases that cause dementia, these diseases must be diagnosed as early as possible. However, many of these underlying diseases, including synucleinopathies (PD, LBD, MSA, etc.), tauopathies (AD, CDB, PSP, etc.), and vascular or mixed dementias, clinically overlap despite intensive research. Thus, an exact diagnosis is often not possible in individual cases, especially in the absence of prototypical clinical symptoms.
Program objectives
The aim of our research group is to improve the early detection and differential diagnosis of dementia by combining specific neuropsychological, clinical-neurological, neuroradiological and nuclear medicine examination procedures. A hypothesis-led and specific neuropsychological examination as well as extensive volumetry of specific brain areas (MRT) should enable the patients examined to be characterized and differentiated as precisely as possible. In particular, atypical Parkinson's diseases (MSA, CBD, PSP and DLB) and their overlap with FTLD spectrum disorders (especially PPA and bvFTD) should be better characterized and differentiated. Furthermore, we would like to find out to what extent this characterization enables a more needs-based supply to nuclear medicine examinations or correlates with the examination results of these procedures (FDG-PET, amyloid-PET, DaTSCAN, Tau-PET)
Selection of current projects
- Diagnosis of Lewy body dementia in psychiatry: Retrospective evaluation of all DatSCAN examinations from 2014 to 2019.
- Prospective study for the early detection and phenotyping of patients with Lewy body dementia using neuropsychiatric, neuropsychological and monoaminergic markers: EARLY-LBD
- FTLD spectrum disorders: characterization and differentiation of CBD and PSP on a neuropsychological level
Collaboration
Contact
Research group leaders
Dr. Claudia Lange (Dipl.-Psych.)
Tel.: +49 551 398951
Fax.: +49 551 3912712
clange(at)gwdg.de
- Clinical Neuropsychologist (GNP)
Priv.-Doz. Dr. Caroline Bouter
Tel.: +49 551 398517
Fax.: +49 551 398526
caroline.bouter(at)med.uni-goettingen.de
- Specialist in nuclear medicine
Priv.-Doz. Dr. Christoph van Riesen
Tel.: +49 551 3962184
Fax.: +49 551 398405
christoph.van-riesen(at)med.uni-goettingen.de
- Specialist in neurology
- Head of the Outpatient Clinic for Parkinson's Disease and Other Movement Disorders
- German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE)