Degenerative cerebral alterations in Chinese aged 65 years or older.

The brains of 57 consecutive Chinese patients, aged 65 years or above, dying in a regional general hospital, the causes of death of whom were not primarily intracranial, were examined for parameters of degenerative brain disease--reduction in brain weight, ventricular enlargement, neurofibrillary tangles, senile plaques, granulovacuolar degenerations, and ischemic lesions. Semi-quantitative analysis of these morphological changes suggests that, though generally similar to those observed among Caucasians, they occurred much less frequently, and, as regards senile plaques, in smaller numbers. These observations suggest a lower prevalence of "senile" cerebral alterations in Chinese than in Caucasians.