Effect of Levodopa on verbal and spatial working memory in elderly patients with Parkinson's disease / 中华老年医学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To observe the effects of levodopa on verbal and spatial working memory in elderly patients with Parkinson's disease (PD).Methods The modified Smith working memory software were applied to study the verbal and spatial working memory in 32 PD patients before and 8 weeks after treatment with levodopa and benserazide hydrochloride tablets.The results of PD patients were compared with those in 32 normal controls matched for age,sex and education.Results The correct rates of phonological verbal and coordinate visuospatial working memory were significantly lower in the PD patients without treatment than in the normal controls (both P＜0.01).The correct rates of semantic verbal and categorical visuospatial working memory had no significant differences between the PD patients without treatment and the normal controls (both P＞0.05).The correct rates of phonological verbal working memory and coordinate visuospatial working memory were significantly higher in the PD patients after administration of levodopa and benserazide tablets than in PD patients without treatment [(88.6±6.5)％ vs.(82.1 ± 6.6)％,(84.2±8.8)％ vs.(75.2±8.9)％,respectively,both P＜0.01],but there were no significant differences in the correct rates of semantic verbal working memory and categorical visuospatial working memory between the above two groups (both P＞0.05).The correct rates of phonological verbal,semantic verbal,coordinate visuospatial and categorical visuospatial working memory were negatively correlated with the course of disease,and had no correlations with age and the degree of education.Conclusions Levodopa can improve the functions of phonological verbal working memory and the coordinate visuospatial working memory,but has no effect on the semantic verbal working memory and the categorical visuospatial working memory.It is postulated that dopamine replacement therapy may have double dissociable effects on the different working memories.