Discordance and concordance of dementia of the Alzheimer type (DAT) in monozygotic twins indicate heritable and sporadic forms of Alzheimer's disease.

Rapoport, S I; Pettigrew, K D; Schapiro, M B · Neurology · 1991

case_control · Level III

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Abstract

Monozygotic (MZ) twin pairs concordant for dementia of the Alzheimer type (DAT) or for proven Alzheimer's disease (AD) have a significantly higher frequency of a positive family history (DAT or AD in at least one first-degree relative, p less than 0.002) than do discordant MZ twin pairs, consistent with a lesser predicted distribution of proportions of surviving first-degree relatives without DAT (or AD) (p less than 0.001). The results suggest that concordant MZ twin pairs with DAT (or AD) have a heritable form of disease. AD in discordant twins may result from environmental influences or from a somatic chromosomal change following zygotic division.

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