Heterogeneity of Alzheimer’s disease identified by neuropsychological test profiling

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 18; no. 10; p. e0292527
• Main Authors: Nguyen, Truc Tran Thanh, Lee, Hsun-Hua, Huang, Li-Kai, Hu, Chaur-Jong, Yeh, Chih-Yang, Yang, Wei-Chung Vivian, Lin, Ming-Chin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: San Francisco Public Library of Science 05.10.2023; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Advertising executives; Algorithms; Alzheimer's disease; Atrophy; Biology and Life Sciences; Brain research; Care and treatment; Clinical trials; Cluster analysis; Clustering; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive ability; Datasets; Dementia; Dementia disorders; Diagnosis; Disease; Evaluation; Heterogeneity; Hospitals; Medical imaging; Medical records; Medical research; Medical tests; Medicine and Health Sciences; Medicine, Experimental; Memory; National health insurance; Neurodegenerative diseases; Neuroimaging; Neuropsychology; Patients; Research and Analysis Methods; Short term memory; Social Sciences; Subgroups; Taiwan
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0292527

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a highly heterogeneous disorder. Untangling this variability could lead to personalized treatments and improve participant recruitment for clinical trials. We investigated the cognitive subgroups by using a data-driven clustering technique in an AD cohort. People with mild–moderate probable AD from Taiwan was included. Neuropsychological test results from the Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument were clustered using nonnegative matrix factorization. We identified two clusters in 112 patients with predominant deficits in memory (62.5%) and non-memory (37.5%) cognitive domains, respectively. The memory group performed worse in short-term memory and orientation and better in attention than the non-memory group. At baseline, patients in the memory group had worse global cognitive status and dementia severity. Linear mixed effect model did not reveal difference in disease trajectory within 3 years of follow-up between the two clusters. Our results provide insights into the cognitive heterogeneity in probable AD in an Asian population.