Clinical aspects of familial forms of frontotemporal dementia associated with parkinsonism

Frontotemporal dementia is the second most common dementia among people under the age of 65. Fifty percent of affected patients have an associated family history. Several pathogenic genes have been identified for frontotemporal dementia associated with parkinsonism, including microtubule-associated protein tau, progranulin, and chromatin modifying protein 2B, and fused in sarcoma. It has also been reported that frontotemporal dementia associated with parkinsonism can be linked to chromosome 9p. In addition, there are families with frontotemporal dementia associated with a parkinsonian phenotype but unknown genetic status. Some of these kindreds have been diagnosed clinically as familial progressive supranuclear palsy, hereditary diffuse leukoencephalopathy with axonal spheroids, "overlap" syndrome, and others. Clinical presentation of frontotemporal dementia associated with parkinsonism is variable at age of symptomatic disease onset, disease duration, symptoms, and their occurrence during the disease course. Clinically, it is often difficult to sort out the different genetic forms of frontotemporal dementia associated with parkinsonism. However, with available clinical genetic testing for known genes, the precise diagnosis can be accomplished in some cases.