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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Neurosci.
Sec. Neurodegeneration
Volume 18 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnins.2024.1406694
This article is part of the Research Topic Neurodegenerative Diseases and Gangliosides View all 7 articles

Elevated Plasma Total Homocysteine Levels are Associated with Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia with Lewy Bodies

Provisionally accepted
Zhang Gui Zhang Gui 1Xu Ying Xu Ying 1Liu shuai Liu shuai 2*Lingyun Ma Lingyun Ma 3zhihong ren zhihong ren 4*jun ma jun ma 5*Wei Zhang Wei Zhang 6*Yong Ji Yong Ji 6*
  • 1 Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, Beijing Municipality, China
  • 2 Tianjin Key Laboratory of Cerebrovascular and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, Tianjin, China
  • 3 Department of Neurology, Beijing Luhe Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, Beijing, China
  • 4 Department of Neurology, Electric Power Teaching Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China
  • 5 Department of Hematology, Chui Yang Liu Hospital affiliated to Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
  • 6 Department of Neurology, Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Objective: To investigate the association between plasma total homocysteine (tHcy) levels and behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) in dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) patients.: 82 DLB patients and 134 age-matched healthy controls were included in this study. DLB patients were assessed using Mini Mental Status Examination (MMSE), Clinical Dementia Rating scale (CDR) and Neuropsychiatric inventory (NPI). Plasma tHcy, serum vitamin B12 and folate were measured in all study subjects. We used the Spearman's rank correlation test to analyze the association between the tHcy concentrations and the NPI score, MMSE, CDR and duration of dementia in the DLB patients.Results: Clincally significant BPSD were present in 92.7% DLB patients.The most frequent BPSD were hallucinations (30.4%), apathy (30.4%) and delusions (26.8%).The elevated plasma tHcy Levels are significantly associated with total NPI scores of DLB patients, particularly in 10 NPI sub-domains except for agitation/aggression and disinhibition. No statistically significant association between the plasma tHcy levels and MMSE, CDR and the duration of dementia was found.Limitations: Longitudinal studies and larger sample are required to explore the relationship between tHcy levels and BPSD in DLB patients as the disease progress.Conclusions: Our study highlighted the high incidence of BPSD and firstly showed that BPSD were associated with elevated plasma tHcy levels in DLB patients in china, and the results supported the hypothesis that controlling the homocysteine levels could open up a new direction for management of BPSD.

    Keywords: Dementia with Lewy bodies, Homocysteine, Behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia, cognitive dysfunction, Dementia

    Received: 25 Mar 2024; Accepted: 14 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Gui, Ying, shuai, Ma, ren, ma, Zhang and Ji. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Liu shuai, Tianjin Key Laboratory of Cerebrovascular and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, Tianjin, 300350, China
    zhihong ren, Department of Neurology, Electric Power Teaching Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100073, China
    jun ma, Department of Hematology, Chui Yang Liu Hospital affiliated to Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100022, China
    Wei Zhang, Department of Neurology, Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China
    Yong Ji, Department of Neurology, Beijing Tiantan Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China

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