Epidemiological, clinical, neuropsychological and neuroimaging features characterise vascular dementia (VaD) from other dementias of non-Alzheimer type. VaD does not represent a single entity, but quite a large group of conditions characterised by different pathophysiological correlates and various clinical findings. Subcortical VaD, in particular, is considered as a model of VaD because its well-defined diagnostic criteria allow identification of a homogeneous category for a better approach to investigation in diagnosis and treatment of vascular dementia.