Each study has a usefulness score out of 100 (rubric version 4.0). Tap a score to see what makes it up.
Highest usefulness score first. Studies without a score come last.
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For older groups, being overweight [body mass index (BMI; in kg/m 2 ): 25 to Objective: This study aimed to estimate associations between combined measurements of BMI and waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) with mortality and incident coronary artery disease (CAD).
Why it matters
This study examined how body mass index and waist-to-hip ratio relate to mortality and coronary artery disease in older adults. It does not address treating, curing, or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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Cerebrovascular disease typically manifests with stroke, cognitive impairment, or both.
Why it matters
This review describes vascular cognitive impairment as all forms of cognitive disorder associated with cerebrovascular disease, ranging from mild cognitive impairment to dementia, and notes it frequently coexists with neurodegenerative pathology. It states that targeting vascular risk may help prevent dementia, even of the Alzheimer type.
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Variation in use of APMs in U.S. nursing homes based upon facility characteristics exemplifies the need for a more systematic protocol guiding the use of these medications, along with heightened regulatory policies and enforcement.
Why it matters
This review summarizes research on antipsychotic medication use in U.S. nursing homes and notes that these drugs are associated with risks including hospitalization and death. It does not address treating, curing, or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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BPSD are common in older hospital patients with dementia and associated with considerable distress in nursing staff, as well as a wide range of special treatments needs and additional behavioural and medical complications.
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55/100
The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) has a high sensitivity for detecting cognitive dysfunction.
Why it matters
This study established Swedish normative data for the Montreal Cognitive Assessment from 860 randomly selected elderly people, excluding those with dementia or mild cognitive impairment. It is about interpreting test scores correctly and does not address treating, curing or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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Two decades of epidemiological research shows that silent cerebrovascular disease is common and is associated with future risk for stroke and dementia.
Why it matters
This scientific statement reports strong evidence that silent cerebrovascular disease is common in aging and that silent brain infarcts and white matter hyperintensities are associated with future symptomatic stroke risk independently of other vascular risk factors. It notes there were no randomized controlled trials targeted specifically to participants with silent cerebrovascular disease.
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Progressive and relatively circumscribed loss of semantic knowledge, referred to as semantic dementia (SD) which falls under the broader umbrella of frontotemporal dementia, was officially identified as a clinical syndrome less than 50 years ago.
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Depression, anxiety and sleep problems are the main challenges that are faced by family caregivers of patients with Alzheimer's disease.
Why it matters
Among 309 caregivers of Alzheimer's patients in China, lower patient functional status and caregivers' own poorer physical status, lower life satisfaction, and higher depression and anxiety were linked to greater caregiver burden. This cross-sectional study shows associations only, so it cannot prove what causes the burden.
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55/100
Cognitive impairment, which is frequently undocumented, may indicate greater risk of readmission for individuals with HF than those without.
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Late-life depressive symptoms have been extensively studied for their relationship with incident dementia, but have been typically assessed at a single timepoint.
Why it matters
This study measured depressive symptoms repeatedly over ten years in older adults and then tracked who developed dementia. It examined whether the course of depression over time is linked to dementia risk, which may help identify people at higher risk but does not test a treatment.
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Building on well-established animal data demonstrating the effects of early maternal support on hippocampal development and adaptive coping, a few longitudinal studies suggest that early caregiver support also impacts human hippocampal development.
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Setup and daily use of mHealth technology appears to be feasible for a person with cognitive impairment with the help of a partner, but increasing daily step counts over 8 weeks was not achieved.
Why it matters
In this small feasibility study, only 62% of participants with cognitive impairment completed the physical activity programme and they did not increase their weekly step count, while those with normal cognition did. This shows a physical activity prescription programme was not feasible for many people with cognitive impairment and says nothing about treating or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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Lateralization of function is an important organization of the human brain.
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This study examined the effectiveness of three different learning methods: trial and error learning (TE), errorless learning (EL) and learning by modeling with spaced retrieval (MR) on the relearning process of IADL in mild-to-moderately severe Alzheimer's Dementia (AD) patients (n=52), using a 6-weeks randomized controlled trial design.
Why it matters
In a six-week randomized trial of 52 patients with mild-to-moderately severe Alzheimer's dementia, three learning methods had similar effectiveness for relearning daily activities. The study confirms relearning is possible with individualized interventions and improvements can be maintained after the intervention.
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Arterial spin labeling (ASL) is a non-invasive MRI technique to measure cerebral blood flow (CBF).
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Dementia is receiving increasing attention from governments and politicians.
Why it matters
Comparing dementia occurrence across five western European studies, four showed non-significant changes, while one UK study found a significant 22% decrease in prevalence and a Spanish study found a significant 43% decrease in men. These findings suggest dementia occurrence may have changed over time, possibly due to improved education and living conditions, but they do not provide a treatment or cure.
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The study will provide evidence for evaluating and understanding the role of electroacupuncture in the treatment of Alzheimer's disease.
Why it matters
This is a protocol for a randomized, sham-controlled trial testing whether 8 weeks of electroacupuncture slows cognitive decline in 150 older adults with mild cognitive impairment. No results are available yet, so it is not known whether electroacupuncture helps.
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Although patient factors remain associated with differential healthcare utilization at the end of life, utilization declined over time and use of palliative care services increased.
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The identification of biological and pathophysiological processes implicated in different forms of dementia is itself dependent on reliable descriptions of cognitive performance and capacities.
Why it matters
In 60 elderly rural residents, imaging markers were significantly associated with mobile assessments of semantic memory performance but not with traditional neuropsychological test scores, and activities such as reading or crossword puzzles were linked to later same-day increases in semantic memory performance. This is an early, small study about detection and daily measurement, not about treating, curing, or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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These findings suggest that the sleep-wake cycle plays a crucial part in brain ageing, pointing to a potential avenue for improvement of cognitive outcomes in people at risk of cognitive decline and dementia.
Why it matters
This review of observational studies supports a role for sleep disturbances, particularly sleep duration, sleep fragmentation, and sleep-disordered breathing, in the development of cognitive impairment. It suggests the sleep-wake cycle may be a potential avenue for improving cognitive outcomes in people at risk of cognitive decline and dementia, but the underlying mechanisms are not completely understood.
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Stronger adherence to the Mediterranean diet may reduce the rate of cognitive decline among black, but not white older adults.
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The proposed criteria for VCD provide a coherent approach to the diagnosis of this diverse group of disorders, with a view to stimulating clinical and pathologic validation studies.
Why it matters
This statement proposes new diagnostic criteria for vascular cognitive disorders, including mild vascular cognitive disorder and vascular dementia, and emphasizes that Alzheimer disease pathology often occurs alongside them. It is about diagnosis only and offers nothing on treating, curing or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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The small effect of VRFs and LAD on WMH suggests that WMH have a large "nonvascular," nonatheromatous etiology.
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The prevalences of overall MCI, MCI-A, MCI-CVD, MCI-VRF, and MCI-O were 20.8% (95% confidence interval [CI] = 20.0-21.6%), 6.1% (95% CI = 5.7-6.6%), 3.8% (95% CI = 3.4-4.2%), 4.9% (95% CI = 4.5-5.4%), and 5.9% (95% CI = 5.5-6.4%) respectively.
Why it matters
This survey of elderly Chinese residents found an overall mild cognitive impairment prevalence of 20.8%, with vascular-related MCI being most common. It describes how MCI is distributed in this population but does not test any treatment or prevention.
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Direct measurement of prevalence of palliative care needs on a population basis is feasible.
From across this topic
10 of the 7,967 studies in this topic, picked by a fixed rule (a hash of each study's address), not by score or date; each page of this list shows a different 10. The same 10 appear here every time.
- Estimated Glucose Disposal Rate and Risk of Stroke and Dementia in Nondiabetics: A UK Biobank Prospective Cohort Study
- A Mindfulness-Based Lifestyle Intervention for Dementia Risk Reduction: Protocol for the My Healthy Brain Feasibility Randomized Controlled Trial
- A qualitative study with people with young-onset dementia and their family caregivers on advance care planning: A holistic, flexible, and relational approach is recommended
- An Italian Model of Dementia Special Care Unit
- Development and implementation of an inpatient acute palliative care service
- General practitioners' perceptions of the barriers and solutions to good-quality palliative care in dementia
- Association of Ischemic Stroke Incidence, Severity, and Recurrence With Dementia in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Cohort Study
- Neuropsychological performance in advanced age: influences of demographic factors and Apolipoprotein E: findings from the Cache County Memory Study
- Structured vs Self-Guided Multidomain Lifestyle Interventions for Global Cognitive Function: The US POINTER Randomized Clinical Trial
- Efficacy and tolerability of donepezil in vascular dementia: positive results of a 24-week, multicenter, international, randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial