Mohamed E. Elwan¹, Wafik M. El-Sheikh¹, Mohamed S. El-Zawawy²,

Rasha A. El-Kapany¹, Rasha S. Abd El-Ghany¹

Departments of Neurology¹ and Radiology², Menoufiya University; Egypt

Background: Cognitive deficits are frequently detected in patients with multiple sclerosis and recent magnetic resonance imaging studies demonstrated an association between lesion burden and cognitive impairment. Objective: was to detect cognitive impairment in multiple sclerosis patients and its relation to magnetic resonance imaging findings. Methods: This study included 24 patients of both sexes with definite multiple sclerosis and 24 healthy control persons matched for age, sex and education. All patients and control groups were subjected to the following: full history taking, complete general and neurological examination, neuropsychological assessment using Stanford Binet "4^th edition battery and MRI of the brain. Results: 24 patients with multiple sclerosis (9 males and 15 females) their mean age was 33.96±8.18 years. There was highly statistically significant difference between both groups (P<0.001) in bead memory, sentence memory and quantitative test and statistically significant difference (P<0.05) in pattern analysis and vocabulary tests. There was negative correlation between disease duration and subtests of Stanford Binet. 21 patients had signs of brain atrophy (dilated third ventricle and increased bicaudate ratio). The mean values of Stanford Binet subtests were lower in those patients when compared with patients with normal third ventricle diameter and bicaudate ratio. Conclusion: It was concluded that, multiple sclerosis affect cognitive ability of the patients and there was correlation between the MRI parameters of brain atrophy and cognitive impairment in those patients. [Egypt J Neurol Psychiat Neurosurg.  2011; 48(4): 331-336]

 Key Words: Multiple sclerosis- Cognition-MRI

Tel: +020106167183. Email: dr_rasha_11@yahoo.com.