American actor and producer, Bruce Willis, 67 years oldended his career in March 2022. His family has just announced through a press release that he will be suffering from frontotemporal dementia. A news that is reminiscent of the aphasia suffered by Bruce Willis: last year, the relatives of the star had revealed that he suffered from it. Aphasia is a partial or complete loss of ability to speak or understand written and spoken language.
Frontotemporal degeneration or dementia affects the cognitive abilities. About 6,000 patients are affected by this pathology in France, estimates the Brain Institute (ICM). This disease accounts for 10% of dementias. The first symptoms usually appear between 50 and 65 years old and are manifested by behavioral, emotional and language disorders.
Frontotemporal dementia: symptoms are more obvious compared to Alzheimer’s disease
“About 50% of frontotemporal dementias are hereditary and originate a genetic mutation carried by genes located on different chromosomes. These genes code for proteins such as progranulin, the TAU protein and others, whose role is still very little known.
Frontotemporal dementia is none other thana variant of Alzheimer’s disease. It involves executive function disorders and behavioral disorders.
In the early stages of the disease, symptoms can be attributed to a mental fatigue, then some patients will present uninhibited behaviors, that is to say loss of control over their actions and words. Others will show obsessive-compulsive behaviors.
“The symptoms are not related to memory, but rather to behavior. There are also language disorders, for example, explains for Medisite Dr. Georges Retali neurologist and Member of the French Society of Neurology.
Language disorders are generally observed in all patients, either by inability to articulate, or by lack of understanding and identification of objects or people.
This type of dementia appears relatively early and proves more aggressive than Alzheimer’s disease. “His symptoms are more obvious, because they relate to behavior,” adds our neurologist.
“The cycle is neuropsychological and the disease reaches the lobe frontal of the brain”. This is the region of the brain that is responsible for motor, voluntary and language coordination.
“We can’t cure it”
“This disease progresses to the most important parts of the brain. There is no cure for it because it is a neurodegenerative disease“, says Dr. Retali. This form of dementia will only evolve over time.
Diagnosis can be made by MRI, but especially by nuclear imaging.
“The therapies offered consist of alleviating the symptoms, improving the daily life of the patient and his relatives. Patient care is multidisciplinary by a specialized team, neurologists, neuropsychologists, speech therapists and clinical psychologists, and is optimal in dedicated expert centers to these pathologies”, specifies the ICM.