[Magnetoencephalographic study in patients with cognitive impairment].

Introduction: In early stages, dementia is a neurodegenerative process with difficult diagnosis. Although well defined clinically, its neurophysiological, neuroradiological and metabolic diagnosis is still unsuccessful.
Patients and Method: A MEG study using a 148 channel whole head magnetometer (Magnes 2500 WH) and evaluation by mini mental state examination (MMSE) was performed in 31 subjects. Statistical analyses was made to correlate number of dipoles of slow waves and neuropsychological variables.
Results: The 63.3% (21 patients) show slow waves dipoles in temporal lobes (52.3% were bitemporal). Right temporal lobe has 119.5 23.3 dipoles (averaged value), and left temporal lobe has 126.2 19.8 dipoles (averaged value). The 25% (8 patients) shown slow waves dipoles in parietals lobes, 5 of them biparietal. Correlation between MMSE averaged scores and temporal lobe dipoles was r= 0.84.
Conclusion: MEG results show that slow waves dipoles number in temporal lobes is related with low scores in the mini mental state examination. MEG could be a usefully complementary method in evaluation and following of degree of cognitive impairment in these patients