Magnetic resonance imaging in vascular dementia.

Patients with vascular dementia show distinctive white matter lesions on MRI. We performed MRI on 34 patients with documented ischemic cerebrovascular disease to see whether demented and nondemented patients differ with respect to enlarged CSF spaces or white matter lesions. All eight demented patients had white matter lesions on MRI, just as did many borderline and nondemented patients. Enlargement of central CSF spaces was the only radiographic feature that was seen more commonly in demented than in nondemented patients with ischemic cerebrovascular disease.