Yet, despite the increase in literature on CAA-related cognitive and psychiatric symptoms, the specific characteristics of symptoms in CAA are difficult to assess because of the substantial prevalence of comorbidities such as small vessel disease due to high blood pressure, Lewy body disease and, of course, AD, all of which act as important confounding factors.
A retrospective clinico-pathologic study of 100 patients with autopsy proven PD (including 44 cases with dementia/PDD) and 20 cases of dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) confirmed essential clinical (duration of illness, Mini-Mental State Examination/MMSE, age at death) and morphologic differences between these groups; Lewy body Braak scores and Alzheimer pathologies (neuritic Braak stage, cortical Abeta plaque load, and generalized cerebral amyloid angiopathy or CAA) were significantly higher/more severe in DLB and PDD than in PD without dementia.