Neuroimaging in vascular dementia

Yuichiro Ii, Hidekazu Tomimoto

Department of Neurology, Mie University Graduate School of Medicine

Vascular dementia (VaD) is the second most common cause of dementia, following Alzheimer’s disease. VaD is a heterogenous syndrome consisting of multi-infarct dementia (MID), strategic single infarct dementia and small vessel disease with dementia. Neuroimaging plays a key role in the diagnosis of VaD. Morphological neuroimaging such as CT and MRI provide evidence of vascular lesions. On the other hand, functional neuroimaging techniques including MRS, DTI, SPECT and PET are important to evaluate biochemical information of the brain. In this article, we sort out the point of neuroimaging of various subtypes of VaD according to the NINDS-AIREN criteiria, and also refer to the recent topics related to functional neuroimaging of VaD.

Address correspondence to Dr. Yuichiro Ii, Department of Neurology, Mie University Graduate School of Medicine (Edobashi 20174, Tsu, Mie 514-8507, Japan)