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Technical University of Munich

New study published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease Reports

The study investigated whether impairments in hand motor function differ between early- and late-onset Alzheimer’s disease, and how these impairments relate to everyday functioning.
Figure: Correlation between the time needed to complete the Jebsen-Taylor Hand Function Test (JTHFT) with the dominant hand and frequency averaged over all handwriting and sequencing tasks in patients with early-onset (EOAD) and late-onset (LOAD) Alzheimer’s disease. One outlier (JTHFT: 118.7 s) is not displayed.

Alzheimer’s disease (AD), the leading cause of dementia, is characterized by progressive cognitive decline and increasing difficulties in activities of daily living (ADL). Beyond cognitive symptoms, deficits in hand motor function may also occur. With reports of an overall more aggressive disease course in early-onset AD (EOAD; symptom-onset < age 65) as compared to late-onset AD (LOAD; symptom-onset ≥ 65), the severity of impairments may depend on the age of AD onset. 

In the present study, handwriting and sequencing frequencies were significantly reduced in AD patients compared to healthy controls, with no effect of age at AD onset. Notably, handwriting and sequencing kinematics correlated strongly with ADL performance as measured using the Jebsen-Taylor Hand Function Test (JTHFT) only in EOAD, but not in LOAD. Global cognition, assessed by the Mini-Mental State Examination Score was not related to ADL performance in either patient group.

These findings suggest that kinematic analysis is a sensitive tool for detecting hand motor impairments in AD and that EOAD and LOAD do not differ in hand motor deficits, but in whether these deficits translate into everyday functional limitations.

Stetter, L., Wolski, L., Grimmer, T., Diehl-Schmid, J., & Hermsdörfer, J. (2025). Hand motor function of patients with early- and late-onset Alzheimer's disease and its relation to activities of daily living. Journal of Alzheimer's Disease Reports, 9, 25424823251385512. https://doi.org/10.1177/25424823251385512

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