Performance of Patients with Frontotemporal Dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease on an Activities of Daily Living Task Amina Flowers, Shira Kern, Iliana Meza-Gonzalez, Dr. Jill Razani Introduction Alzheimer's’ disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease characterized by deficits located in the parietal and posterior temporal cortices, which in turn cause a profound inability to participate in activities that involve, learning, memory, language, and visual-spatial tasks. Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) is also a neurodegenerative disease. It attacks the frontal and anterior temporal cortices. This in turn, results in an inability to perform activities that require executive functioning, memory, and visual spatial skills. We know little about how these two forms of dementia differ in their ability to carry out different ADL tasks. The purpose of this study was to examine similarities and differences between FTD and AD, as compared to normal controls, on a activities of daily living task. Method Participants: A total of 139 participants were included in this analysis: 62 participants were previously diagnosed with AD, 12 with FTD, and 65 were aged matched normal controls. Participants were recruited from medical centers within the Greater Los Angeles area Daily Functional task: Participants were administered the DAFS, an observation based test. For the purposed of this study, 5 subscales were analyzed: 1) time orientation assesses (a) ability to tell time using a clock and (b) orientation to person, place, and date; 2) communication skills assesses (a) the ability to use a telephone and (b) the ability to prepare and mail a letter ; 3) transportation skills assesses (a) the ability to identify road signs and knowing driving rules; Results Univariate ANOVAs revealed that controls outperformed AD and FTD patients on most sections of the DAFS. Specifically, AD and FTD groups performed poorer than controls (but not each other) on DAFS communication, transportation, and shopping subscales. However, in terms of the specific subscores within the subscales, FTD and controls did not differ on the following : time telling, orientation to date, identifying currency, counting currency, writing a check. Finally, AD and controls did not differ on the following subscales: letter mailing and shopping with a list subscales. All p values for significant differences were less than.05. Discussion Despite the differences in pathology and cognitive deficits in AD and FTD, the current findings suggest that both patient groups have similar difficulties in carrying out activities of daily living, in comparison to normal age-matched controls. Most notably, both groups have a lot of difficulty with a shopping task. One of the greatest areas of impairment for both patient groups is the ability to carryout a shopping task, which has a high memory demand. A limitations of this study is the small sample size of the FTD patients. Additional studies are needed with larger FTD participants in order to replicate these findings. The findings suggest that healthcare providers should address functional limitations in these patient groups. Acknowledgements We would like to thank Dr. Jill Razani for her wonderful mentorship. This project was in part supported by NIGMS grant GM to JR and the NIGMS Minority Access to Research Careers (MARC) grant GM Method (continued) 4) financial skills assesses (a) the ability to identify currency, (b) the ability to count currency, (c) the ability to write a check, (d) the ability to balance a checkbook; 5) shopping skills assesses (a) the ability to “shop” from a mock grocery store by freely recalling shopping items, (b) “shop” by recognizing items, and (c) “shop” with a list. The ability to make correct change is also included on the shopping skills subscale, but for the purposes of this study and analyzes was separated as its own subscale.