FTD Syndromes – KnowNeuropsychology

These learning questions are brought to you by the KnowNeuropsychology / APPCN collaboration.

*This quiz has three multiple-choice questions and two discussion questions.

1 / 5

You’re seeing a 62 year old woman who was referred by her neurologist for a neuropsychological evaluation to help to better characterize her language and other cognitive deficits in the context of a diagnosis of suspected primary progressive aphasia (PPA). During interview, she exhibited frequent word finding problems, although grammar and motor speech seemed normal. Language testing revealed deficits on tests of naming and repetition, although object knowledge and single word comprehension were normal. Based on this information, your patient’s profile is most consistent with:

Primary progressive apraxia of speech

Non-fluent PPA

Logopenic PPA

Semantic PPA

2 / 5

With regard to more recent research on neuropsychological testing and FTD syndromes, which of the following statements is most true:

General executive dysfunction on testing tends to reliably differentiate behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) from primary progressive aphasia (PPA).

Memory deficits can be helpful in differentiating frontotemporal dementia from Alzheimer’s disease.

Perseverative errors on executive tests such as Design Fluency are more often seen with FTD than with AD.

Slowed word retrieval on visual confrontation naming tests tends to best differentiate FTD from AD.

3 / 5

Which of the following is not listed in the Rascovsky et al. (2011) diagnostic criteria for behavioral variant FTD (bvFTD)?

Compulsive behavior

Alexithymia

Apathy

Hyperorality

4 / 5

Discussion Question: What are examples of tests of social cognition that may be used when testing FTD patients, and what specific social cognitive abilities do they measure?

5 / 5

Discussion Question: For the 62-year-old patient in Question 1 above, what measures might be most helpful for this differential diagnosis? How might you educate her and her family when they ask whether (and how) her cognitive symptoms may progress? What recommendations might you make for compensatory strategies and aids given her specific language deficits? What pathological substrate most often causes this syndrome?

Your score is

Neuropsychology of FTD Syndromes

Adam Staffaroni, Ph.D.