The overall objective of the Clinical Core is to recruit, evaluate and follow patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD), related dementing disorders and normal controls to provide well-characterized subjects for clinical research projects and subsequent pathologic studies. The specific aims are a) to recruit, evaluate and systematically longitudinally follow patients with AD and related dementing disorders, b) to recruit and evaluate a series of cognitively normal community-dwelling (N=400) or nursing home (N=50) volunteer control subjects who have consented to prearranged autopsy, c) to provide a systematic longitudinal follow-up of cognitive function (annual) and neurologic findings (every other year) of control subject, d) to maintain a clinical, neuropsychologic and behavioral database on AD, related dementing disorders, and control subjects, e) to increase the number of AD patients who come to autopsy and then investigate associations between neurologic, neuropsychologic, and behavioral findings as they relate to quantitative histopathologic and regional changes found at autopsy, f) to continue participation in multicenter therapeutic drug trial, g) to continue participation in consortium projects including the AD Cooperative Studies and CERAD, h) to increase the number of AD and related disorders patients (minority and rural) in our Satellite Diagnostic and Treatment Clinics, and i) to enroll minority and rural control subjects through our Satellite Diagnostic and Treatment Clinics. We presently follow 500 patients in our Memory Disorders Clinic. We have recruited 317 cognitively normal volunteer control subjects, all of whom have consented to brain donation at death.
NIH ExPorter
NIH ExPorter