Cerebral glucose metabolism in corticobasal degeneration: comparison with progressive supranuclear palsy and normal controls.

The regional metabolic rate of glucose was estimated using 18F-labeled 2-deoxyglucose and positron-emission tomography (PET) in eight patients with corticobasal degeneration (CBD). Measures of cerebral glucose metabolism in these patients were compared with those for nine age-matched normal controls and eight patients with progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP). Compared with that in the normal controls, the CBD patients showed significantly reduced cerebral glucose metabolism in the contralateral hemisphere to the clinically most affected side in the dorsolateral frontal, medial frontal, inferior parietal, sensorimotor, and lateral temporal cortex, as well as in the corpus striatum and the thalamus. In comparison with that in PSP, in CBD the glucose metabolism in the contralateral hemisphere was significantly decreased in the inferior parietal, sensorimotor, lateral temporal cortex, and the corpus striatum. These results confirm the marked asymmetric cerebral involvement in CBD and suggest that there are significant differences between CBD and PSP in the cerebral metabolism in some cerebral regions such as the inferior parietal cortex and sensorimotor cortex, which might reflect the differences in their clinical characteristics.