Parkinson's disease with dementia, lewy-body disorders and alpha-synuclein: recent advances and a case report.

The advance in research on the dementia syndrome associated with Parkinson's disease recently gains momentum in part because Parkinson's disease inevitably causes declined cognition and then lead to poor quality of life. More importantly, dementia of Lewy bodies, now known as the second most common neurodegenerative disorder, shares the common neuropathological hallmark with Parkinson's disease and yet exhibits a unique clinical syndrome. Recent genetic, neurochemical and neuropsychological experiments robustly confirm a link between dementia associated with Parkinson's disease and dementia with Lewy bodies. Meanwhile, controversial issues regarding diagnostic criteria and proper treatments remain unresolved. Here I review milestone research conclusions and report a typical case with pathological data in order to clarify different aspects of these two dementia disorders.