Dementia With Lewy BodiesMedical Author:
Howard A Crystal, MD
Medical Editor:
Nicholas Y Lorenzo, MD
Medical Editor:
Mary L Windle, PharmD
Medical Editor:
Helmi L Lutsep, MD
Dementia With Lewy Bodies OverviewDementia is a progressive (gradually worsening) decline of mental abilities that disturbs "cognitive" functions such as memory, thought processes, and speech as well as behavior, and movements. Dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) is the name for a group of disorders in which dementia is caused by the presence of Lewy bodies in the brain. Lewy bodies are small round clumps of normal proteins that for unknown reasons become abnormally clumped together inside neurons (brain cells). Whether the Lewy bodies directly cause gradual degeneration (damage) to the brain cells, impairing their function and eventually killing them, or are only a marker of some other destructive process is not known. |
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Dementia With Lewy Bodies
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Dementia With Lewy Bodies »
Frederick Lewy first described Lewy bodies (LBs), cytoplasmic inclusions found in cells of the substantia nigra in patients with idiopathic Parkinson's disease, in 1914.
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