Agraphia, the inability to write a sentence, was studied in 46 Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients to explore the potential usefulness of this measure in the subtyping of AD. In this sample there was significant correlation between the agraphia and the severity of the cognitive impairment. However, there was no correlation between agraphia and the patients' age, age at onset, duration of the illness, presence of family history of AD, cerebrospinal fluid choline and acetylcholinesterase levels. Agraphia does not seem to help in the subtyping of Alzheimer disease.