Symptomatic Treatment of Vascular Cognitive Impairment (STREAM-VCI): Protocol for a Cross-Over Trial.

Leijenaar JF, Groeneveld GJ, van der Flier WM, Scheltens P, Klaassen ES, Weinstein HC, Biessels GJ, Barkhof F, Prins ND

People with vascular cognitive impairment (VCI) constitute a clinically heterogeneous group, but previous symptomatic drug trials in VCI did not take this clinical heterogeneity into account. Executive dysfunction and memory impairment are the cognitive domains that are most frequently impaired in VCI, and these impairments are likely to reflect vascular damage to specific neurotransmitter systems, which opens the possibility for targeted symptomatic treatment directed at specific neurotransmitters.