New thesis about neuroimaging in dementia with Lewy bodies and related conditions

”The main focus of my thesis is Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) and how we can use neuroimaging to learn more about changes that occur in the brains white matter. We also wanted to know how these changes are connected to different features, for example volume in different brain areas or results on cognitive tests.”

Which are the most important results? 

”Combined the findings in this thesis have highlighted that patients with DLB have a lot of changes in the white matter and its placement and possible characteristics differ from that of healthy people. One of the most important results is that we were able to show that patients with DLB have more of these changes compared to patients with Alzheimer's Disease for example. We could also show that patients with DLB had proportionally more of these changes in white matter in the cholinergic system compared to controls, and it seems that the cholinergic system might be extra vulnerable in patients. The cholinergic system is a very important part of the brain affected in dementia disorders.”

How can this new knowledge contribute to the improvement of people’s health?

”It will aid in correct diagnosis for patients, and it has opened for some future studies of white matter in DLB. We now know that it is common for patients with DLB to have changes in the white matter, which means that it in itself should not exclude a diagnosis. We could also show that it is possible to include patients early in the disease progression and get meaningful results, which is important for future study design.”

What's in the future for you? Will you continue to conduct research?

”My aim is to stay in research, both to continue with my research on DLB and on white matter but also to focus more on research infrastructure and international collaborations. ”