Cognition, apathy, and gait dysfunction in cerebral small vessel disease: A shared neural basis?

Cognition, apathy, and gait dysfunction in cerebral small vessel disease: A shared neural basis?Cerebral small vessel disease (SVD) represents a range of pathological changes in the small blood vessels of the brain.SVD can be detected on MRI, which includes white matter hyperintensities, lacunes, and cerebral microbleeds (Duering et al., 2023).Patients with SVD exhibit significant clinical heterogeneity, often presenting with cognitive impairment, apathy, gait dysfunction, and lacunar stroke (Wardlaw et al., 2019).The chronic and progressive symptoms, such as cognitive and motor complaints, as well as mood disorders, continuously affect SVD patients.This, in turn, often results in a loss of functional independence and a diminished quality of life (Wardlaw et al., 2019).Previous studies have focused on unraveling the underlying mechanisms, the trajectory, and the potential clinical outcomes of these specific symptoms (e.g., cognitive impairment, apathy, and gait dysfunction) in SVD (Wardlaw et al., 2019).However, these studies typically investigated each symptom individually, without integrating these symptoms to provide a comprehensive understanding.