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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This study provides a potential standardized definition for frailty in community-dwelling older adults and offers concurrent and predictive validity for the definition.
Why it matters
Proposes a standard definition of frailty in older adults, using data on 5,317 people aged 65 and older from the Cardiovascular Health Study: three or more of unintentional weight loss, self-reported exhaustion, weakness, slow walking speed, and low physical activity. Frailty affected 6.9% of this community-dwelling group and predicted falls, worsening mobility or disability, hospitalization, and death.
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52/100
The incidence rate for AD was significantly higher among African-American and Caribbean Hispanic elderly individuals compared white individuals.
Why it matters
In a 7-year population-based study in northern Manhattan, the cumulative incidence of Alzheimer's to age 90 was twofold higher among African-American and Caribbean Hispanic older adults than among white individuals. Adjusting for education, illiteracy, stroke, hypertension, heart disease or diabetes did not change these differences.
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The mean age of the CI subjects was 83, and 83% were women.
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Rates of hippocampal atrophy match both baseline cognitive status and the change in cognitive status over time in elderly persons who lie along the cognitive continuum from normal to MCI to AD.
Why it matters
In 129 older adults given MRI scans at the start and again about 3 years later, the hippocampus shrank fastest in people with Alzheimer's disease, then in those with mild cognitive impairment, and slowest in those with normal thinking. Among people who were normal or had mild cognitive impairment at the start, those whose clinical status declined lost hippocampal volume faster than those who stayed stable.
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The results of this study suggest that naftidrofuryl is effective and well tolerated in treating the symptoms of vascular and mixed dementia.
Why it matters
In this one-year trial of 84 patients with vascular or mixed dementia, naftidrofuryl 600 mg/d produced statistically significant improvements in cognitive and global function compared with placebo. The authors concluded that naftidrofuryl is effective and well tolerated for treating the symptoms of these dementias.
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52/100
Psychiatric illness is common after hip fracture, and has significant effects on important outcomes.
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This is the first demonstration in the United Kingdom that the mortality of patients with dementia who are fed by gastrostomy is considerable.
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The authors examined the association of incident dementia and subtypes with age, sex, and geographic area in Europe.
Why it matters
This pooled study of European cohorts found that Alzheimer's disease was the most frequent dementia type at all ages and that dementia incidence was higher in women than men among the very old, with regional differences. It describes incidence patterns but does not test any treatment, cure, or prevention.
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With explanatory covariates, the standard analysis for competing risks data involves modeling the cause-specific hazard functions via a proportional hazards assumption.
Why it matters
A statistics paper proposing a new proportional hazards model for competing risks data that directly assesses how a covariate affects the cumulative incidence of a particular type of failure. It is not about dementia; the worked example uses data from a breast cancer clinical trial.
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Owing to the pharmacokinetic properties of physostigmine when administered by conventional routes, long-term cholinergic treatment of Alzheimer's disease is difficult to manage.
Why it matters
In this trial of 204 patients with probable Alzheimer's disease, the physostigmine patch was not superior to placebo after 24 weeks of treatment. There was even a slight, not statistically significant, trend toward better outcomes in the placebo group, so this treatment did not show benefit.
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Parkinsonism is a common disease among the elderly; its incidence increases steeply with advancing age and is consistently higher in men.
Why it matters
This study counted new cases of parkinsonism and its types in one county over 15 years, finding Parkinson's disease was most common. It describes how often these conditions occur and does not address treating, curing or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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We found that 451 (92.8%) of the patients were testable, 239 (49.2%) of the patients were women, and the mean age was 71.2 years.
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The MMSE scores ranged from 5 to 29 (mean +/- SD = 19.0 +/- 4.8) and the ADAS scores ranged from 7 to 63 (24.3 +/- 10.9).
Why it matters
This Japanese version of the Neuropsychiatric Inventory was tested and found to have reliability and competency comparable to the original version, making it a reliable and useful tool for measuring neuropsychiatric disturbances in dementia patients. Apathy was the most common behavior among the ten abnormal behavioral domains, and total NPI scores correlated significantly with both dementia severity and cognitive impairment.
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We used the medical records linkage system for the population of Rochester, Minnesota, to identify persons in the community who had their first cerebral infarct without previous dementia.
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The common approach to the multiplicity problem calls for controlling the familywise error rate (FWER).
Why it matters
This paper presents a statistical method for controlling the false discovery rate in multiple testing problems. It is a methodological paper and does not directly address treating, curing, or preventing Alzheimer's disease.
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We report the development and validation of an MDS-based cognitive index, the MDS Cognition Scale (MDS-COGS), by evaluating it against two popular dementia rating scales, the Global Deterioration Scale (GDS) and the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE).
Why it matters
This study developed and validated the MDS Cognition Scale for identifying and staging nursing home residents with dementia, assessing 200 residents against the Global Deterioration Scale and the Mini-Mental State Examination. It is a cognitive assessment instrument and does not treat, cure or prevent Alzheimer's disease.
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These results suggest that management of patients with advanced DAT on a DSCU using a palliative care philosophy may result in less patient discomfort and lower costs than management on a TLTC.
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52/100
This longitudinal study of 196 caregiver/care receiver dyads was undertaken to determine the variables predictive of caregiver decision to institutionalize a dependent with dementia.
Why it matters
In this longitudinal study of 196 caregiver and care receiver dyads, seven variables including use of services, enjoyment of caregiving, caregiver burden and health, and troublesome behaviors predicted the decision to institutionalize. Six variables including caregiver health and burden, use of services, care receiver cognitive function and troublesome behaviors, and caregiver reaction to behaviors predicted actual institutionalization at 18 months.
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Some SDAT subjects retain "safe" driving skills.
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Elderly co-resident caregivers for stroke and dementia patients experience similar degrees of burden and high levels of psychological morbidity.
Why it matters
In 99 co-resident caregivers of stroke and dementia patients, 46% had significant psychological morbidity, and no significant differences were found between the two caregiver groups on burden or psychological morbidity. Behaviour and mood disturbance in the patient was significantly correlated with caregiver burden in both groups.
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The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive review of information accumulated over the past 26 years regarding the psychometric properties and utility of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE).
Why it matters
This 1992 review of 26 years of research on the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) judged its reliability and construct validity "to be satisfactory". Compared with diagnostic criteria, clinical diagnoses and other measures, the MMSE showed "high levels of sensitivity for moderate-to-severe cognitive impairment and lower levels for mild degrees of impairment". That means it is better at picking up moderate-to-severe impairment than mild impairment.
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A brief diagnostic battery of neuropsychological tests was developed for a large-scale epidemiological study of dementia.
Why it matters
Researchers built a short set of memory and thinking tests to identify dementia in a large population study, defining dementia as poor memory plus problems in at least two other areas; in a small pilot it matched doctors' working diagnoses in all but two cases. Among 430 older adults, 18% of those with 8 or fewer years of schooling met the test criteria for dementia, compared with 5% of those with more schooling, and correcting scores for education moved 23 people across the line, with daily-functioning checks backing some of those changes but not others. The authors conclude the battery "may have utility" but that education affects test scores and some adjustment may be needed; the study tested no treatment or prevention.
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We conducted full diagnostic evaluations, including a comprehensive cognitive assessment battery, of a group of 32 elderly subjects with a clinically identified mild cognitive impairment and a group of 32 age-matched and education-matched normal subjects.
Why it matters
In a small 1991 study, 23 of 32 older people (72%) who had been clinically identified with mild cognitive impairment showed detectable cognitive decline two years later; among the 20 with no complicating conditions, 16 declined. Several baseline psychological tests separated those who declined from those who did not, but the record does not name the tests or give their accuracy. It tracked decline rather than confirmed dementia diagnoses, and it tested no treatment.
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Providing long-term care for a demented relative profoundly affects caregivers' lives.
Why it matters
This study found that spousal caregivers of dementia patients had worse immune function, more infectious illness, and more depressive disorders than matched controls. It concerns the health of caregivers, not the treatment, cure, or prevention of Alzheimer's disease.
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Postmortem examination was performed on 137 residents (average age 85.5 years) of a skilled nursing facility whose mental status, memory, and functional status had been evaluated during life.
Why it matters
Brain autopsies of 137 nursing home residents found 10 people with good thinking and daily function whose brains showed features of mild Alzheimer's with many plaques. These people had higher brain weights and more large neurons, and the authors suggest they may have had early disease or a greater reserve.
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.
- Obstructive Sleep Apnea is Linked to Depression and Cognitive Impairment: Evidence and Potential Mechanisms
- Cognitive and behavioural effects of music-based exercises in patients with dementia
- Top-funded digital health companies offering lifestyle interventions for dementia prevention: Company overview and evidence analysis
- Zolpidem is independently associated with increased risk of inpatient falls
- Palliative care interventions in advanced dementia
- Self- versus caregiver-reported apathy across neurological disorders
- Human-Centered Ambient and Wearable Sensing for Automated Monitoring in Dementia Care: A Scoping Review
- MIND not Mediterranean diet related to 12-year incidence of cognitive impairment in an Australian longitudinal cohort study
- Multivariate classification of blood oxygen level-dependent FMRI data with diagnostic intention: a clinical perspective
- Diversity in United States Dementia Prevention Trials: An Updated Systematic Review of Eligibility Criteria and Recruitment Strategies