Diagnosis of Frontotemporal Dementia

Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that can present with three different clinical syndromes: behavioural-variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD), associated with behavioural and executive deficits; non-fluent variant primary progressive aphasia (nfPPA), with progressive deficits in speech, grammar, and word output; and semantic variant primary progressive aphasia (svPPA), which is a progressive disorder of semantic knowledge and naming. The disease can mimic various psychiatric disorders and sometimes can be difficult to discriminate against other forms of dementia. Advances in clinical, imaging, and molecular characterisation have increased the accuracy of the diagnosis of frontotemporal dementia. Updated diagnostic criteria have been developed and are now widely used. Recognition and accurate diagnoses of FTD subtypes will aid the neurologist in the management of patients.