STAGING OF ALZHEIMER-TYPE PATHOLOGY - AN INTERRATER-INTRARATER STUDY

The staging method proposed by Braak and Braak is based on the sequent ial accumulation of neurofibrillary pathology in the cerebral cortex, Unlike the currently used diagnostic criteria for Alzheimer's disease (AD) it does not take into consideration the age of the patients and w hether they were demented or not for the establishment of the patholog ical stage of the disease, To examine the interobserver reliability of the method we performed an inter- and intra-rater study using the Bra ak staging method in 41 brains. The agreement between the examiners an d between the diagnoses of the same examiner at different times was al most perfect, the kappa statistics reaching values above 0.90, These f indings indicate that the staging, relying on the differential distrib ution of neuritic pathology in the brain in AD, is a reliable and repr oducible method for the description of AD-related pathology, This make s it suitable for brain-banking and research purposes.