Author(s): Koji Terasawa, Shotaro Misaki, Yuki Murata, Toshiaki Watanabe, Saiki Terasawa, Toshie Kobayashi, Zang Yong, Koki Nakajima, Suchinda Jarupat Maruo and Keisuke Nakade
It is a well-known fact that Alzheimer increases with aging. Early detection of Alzheimer has emerged as an important, because it can prevent of further deterioration of the disease. However, early detection is not always easy because of the lack of good methods to identify the early stage of Alzheimer. The screening tests of Alzheimer used around the world. These tests are relatively time-consuming, difficult and distressing for Alzheimer patients. We consider whether go/no-go task can become the screening test of the Alzheimer patient in future. This study compared results of the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the go/no-go task for between Alzheimer disease patients and normal subjects. The average reaction time and number of total error of go/no-go task that Alzheimer patients were significantly higher than among the normal subjects. About correlation with MMSE and the go/no-go task, 6 items of MMSE had correlations of 4 or more test results concerning response time, forgets and mistakes of go/no-go tasks. These characteristics suggest that there is a possibility that go/no-go tasks could be applied as a measuring method when screening for early signs of Alzheimer.
