• Yasuhiro Nagahama, Tomoko Okina, and Norio Suzuki.
• Department of Geriatric Neurology, Shiga Medical Center, Moriyama, Shiga, Japan.
• J. Neurol. Neurosurg. Psychiatr. 2015 Nov 1;86(11):1248-52.

IntroductionTo examine whether imitation of gestures provided useful information to diagnose early dementia in elderly patients.MethodsImitation of finger and hand gestures was evaluated in patients with mild dementia; 74 patients had dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), 100 with Alzheimer's disease (AD) and 52 with subcortical vascular dementia (SVaD).ResultsSignificantly, more patients with DLB (32.4%) compared with patients with AD (5%) or SVaD (11.5%) had an impaired ability to imitate finger gestures bilaterally. Also, significantly, more patients with DLB (36.5%) compared with patients with AD (5%) or SVaD (15.4%) had lower mean scores of both hands. In contrast, impairment of the imitation of bimanual gestures was comparable among the three patient groups (DLB 50%, AD 42%, SVaD 42.3%).DiscussionOur study revealed that imitation of bimanual gestures was impaired non-specifically in about half of the patients with mild dementia, whereas imitation of finger gestures was significantly more impaired in patients with early DLB than in those with AD or SVaD. Although the sensitivity was not high, the imitation tasks may provide additional information for diagnosis of mild dementia, especially for DLB.Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://group.bmj.com/group/rights-licensing/permissions.

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