"Early diagnosis of FTD can have a tremendous impact on the treatment for patients and their family members. Many patients are misdiagnosed and may be hospitalized and receive drugs for the wrong disease," Foster said in a release announcing the research. "Accurate diagnosis bypasses the costs, side-effects and frustration of misguided care. Furthermore, one-third of FTD patients have a family history of a similar disorder, and family members need to know if they are at increased risk of the disease."

The scan is meant to be used along with medical history and psychometric testing, the tools now used to diagnose dementia.

Cases of dementia are expected to increase significantly in the future — nowhere faster than the Intermountain West and Utah. One barrier to PET scan use, however, is that not all insurance companies will cover it, although Medicare will to evaluate dementia.

The researchers looked at medical records and the FDG-PET scans of 45 patients who were later autopsied. Microscopic examination found 31 had Alzheimer's and 14 had FTD. The researchers also summarized the clinical course each patient's dementia had followed, then gave the information to neurologists at the centers, each with between 10 and 25 years of experience, who had to decide who had which disease.

Those using only the clinical methods were correct in 76 percent to 79 percent of cases. Scan alone yielded a correct dementia diagnosis in 85 percent to 89 percent of cases. And combining the information from the scan and clinical notes raised the correct diagnosis rate to 90 percent. It also increased the experts' confidence in a correct diagnosis or made them question and sometimes change a wrong one in 42 percent of the cases, the release said.

The study was funded by the National Institute on Aging in the National Institutes of Health.

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E-mail: lois@desnews.com