The effects of memantine on a patient having preclinical dementia with Lewy bodies.

OBJECTIVE

Memantine has been reported to have positive effects on visual hallucinations and cognition in patients with dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB). We hypothesized that memantine would have similar effects on a patient having Charles Bonnet syndrome, preclinical DLB.

METHOD: We evaluated the effect of memantine on visual hallucination, cognitive abilities and so on from baseline to 4 months after the start of medication.

RESULTS

Treatment of the patient with memantine resulted in the disappearance of visual hallucinations but could not stop the progression to dementia.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results suggested that, for a patient having preclinical DLB, memantine had some degree of positive effects, but the mechanism remains to be revealed.