In vivo amyloid imaging with PET in frontotemporal dementia (original) (raw)

Abstract

Background

N-methyl[11C]2-(4′methylaminophenyl)-6-hydroxy-benzothiazole (PIB) is a positron emission tomography (PET) tracer with amyloid binding properties which allows in vivo measurement of cerebral amyloid load in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) is a syndrome that can be clinically difficult to distinguish from AD, but in FTD amyloid deposition is not a characteristic pathological finding.

Purpose

The aim of this study is to investigate PIB retention in FTD.

Methods

Ten patients with the diagnosis of FTD participated. The diagnosis was based on clinical and neuropsychological examination, computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging scan, and PET with 18Fluoro-2-deoxy-d-glucose (FDG). The PIB retention, measured in regions of interest, was normalised to a reference region (cerebellum). The results were compared with PIB retention data previously obtained from 17 AD patients with positive PIB retention and eight healthy controls (HC) with negative PIB retention. Statistical analysis was performed with a students t-test with significance level set to 0.00625 after Bonferroni correction.

Results

Eight FTD patients showed significantly lower PIB retention compared to AD in frontal (p < 0.0001), parietal (p < 0.0001), temporal (p = 0.0001), and occipital (p = 0.0003) cortices as well as in putamina (p < 0.0001). The PIB uptake in these FTD patients did not differ significantly from the HC in any region. However, two of the 10 FTD patients showed PIB retention similar to AD patients.

Conclusion

The majority of FTD patients displayed no PIB retention. Thus, PIB could potentially aid in differentiating between FTD and AD.

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Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the Uppsala University Amersham’s Fund (project number UU0058) and the Emma Pettersson Foundation, Sweden, for providing economic support. We thank the staff of Uppsala Imanet for their dedication and professionalism performing this study, in addition to the patients and their relatives for their participation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Nuclear Medicine, Uruguay University Hospital of Clinics and Faculty of Science, Montevideo, Uruguay
    Henry Engler
  2. Department of Nuclear Medicine, Uppsala University Hospital, Uppsala, Sweden
    Henry Engler & Irina Savitcheva
  3. Department of Medical Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
    Henry Engler
  4. Uppsala Imanet, GE Healthcare, Uppsala, Sweden
    Henry Engler & Bengt Långström
  5. Department of Public Health and Caring Sciences/Geriatrics, Uppsala University, Uppsala Science Park, 751 83, Uppsala, Sweden
    Alexander Frizell Santillo, Maria Lindau, Lars Lannfelt & Lena Kilander
  6. Weilun PET Centre, Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital, Guangzhou, China
    Shu Xia Wang
  7. Division of Molecular Neuropharmacology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
    Agneta Nordberg
  8. Department of Geriatric Medicine, Karolinska University Hospital Huddinge, Stockholm, Sweden
    Agneta Nordberg
  9. Departments of Biochemistry and Organic Chemistry, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
    Bengt Långström

Authors

  1. Henry Engler
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  2. Alexander Frizell Santillo
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  3. Shu Xia Wang
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  4. Maria Lindau
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  5. Irina Savitcheva
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  6. Agneta Nordberg
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  7. Lars Lannfelt
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  8. Bengt Långström
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  9. Lena Kilander
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence toHenry Engler or Alexander Frizell Santillo.

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Henry Engler and Alexander Frizell Santillo have contributed in equal part to the content of this article.

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Engler, H., Santillo, A.F., Wang, S.X. et al. In vivo amyloid imaging with PET in frontotemporal dementia.Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging 35, 100–106 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-007-0523-1

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