Familial Nature of Alzheimer's Disease?

Abstract

To the Editor: The recent comment by Breitner and Folstein (July 19 issue)¹ that the "90-year lifetime incidence of dementia in siblings or children of Alzheimer's disease probands with aphasia or apraxia approached 50 per cent" was not based on observation but on statistical projection. Accordingly, their report that this group comprises "78 per cent of Alzheimer's disease cases in nursing homes," and presumably the majority of patients with Alzheimer's disease, may have prematurely alarmed relatives of patients with this disease. In a recent publication² Breitner and Folstein reported that dementing disorder was present in 16 of 308 (5.19 per . . .