Introduction Determining the relationship between age and Alzheimer's disease (AD) presentation is important to improve understanding and provide better patient services. Methods We used AD patient data (N = 7815) from the National Alzheimer Coordinating Center database and multinomial logistic regression to investigate presentation age and first cognitive/behavioral symptoms. Results The odds of having a nonmemory first cognitive symptom (including impairment in judgment and problem solving, language, and visuospatial function) increased with younger age (P <.001, all tests). Compared with apathy/withdrawal, the odds of having depression and "other" behavioral symptoms increased with younger age (P <.02, both tests), whereas the odds of having psychosis and no behavioral symptom increased with older age (P <.001, both tests). Discussion There is considerable heterogeneity in the first cognitive/behavioral symptoms experienced by AD patients. Proportions of these symptoms change with age with patients experiencing increasing nonmemory cognitive symptoms and more behavioral symptoms at younger ages.

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doi.org/10.1016/j.jalz.2014.12.007, hdl.handle.net/1765/82945
Alzheimer's & Dementia
Department of Neurology

Barnes, J., Dickerson, F., Frost, C., Jiskoot, L., Wolk, D., & van der Flier, W. (2015). Alzheimer's disease first symptoms are age dependent: Evidence from the NACC dataset. Alzheimer's & Dementia, 11(11), 1349–1357. doi:10.1016/j.jalz.2014.12.007