Verbal versus non-verbal performances in mild Alzheimer's disease.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the pattern of cognitive impairment in mild Alzheimer's disease (AD). We tested thirty patients (10 men and 20 women) with mini mental state examination (MMSE) scores between 20 and 24. The mental deterioration battery (MDB) was administered to all subjects. For each patient, the mean general score for the 4 verbal and the 4 non-verbal items were calculated, in order to verify the existence of a significant difference between them. In our sample the results showed that the difference between verbal and non-verbal items was not significant, i.e., the disease seems to affect both domains uniformly.