BACKGROUND: Hearing loss is the third most prevalent chronic condition faced by older adults and has been linked to difficulties in speech perception, activities of daily living, and social interaction. Recent studies have suggested a correlation between severity of hearing loss and an individual's cognitive function; however, a causative link has yet to be established. One intervention option for management of the most severe to profound hearing loss in older adults is cochlear implantation. We performed a review to determine the status of the literature on the potential influence of cochlear implantation on cognition in the older adult population. METHODS: Over 3800 articles related to cochlear implants, cognition, and older adults were reviewed. Inclusion criteria were as follows: (1) study population including adults > 65 years, (2) intervention with cochlear implantation, and (3) cognition as the primary outcome measure of implantation. RESULTS: Out of 3,886 studies selected, 3 met inclusion criteria for the review. CONCLUSIONS: While many publications have shown that cochlear implants improve speech perception, social functioning, and overall quality of life, we found no studies in the English literature that have prospectively evaluated changes in cognitive function after implantation with modern cochlear implants in older adults. The state of the current literature reveals a need for further clinical research on the impact of cochlear implantation on cognition in older adults.

Introduction: Dementia is a syndrome due to disease of the brain, usually of a chronic nature, in which there is disturbance of multiple higher cortical functions including Memory, Comprehension, Thinking, Judgment, Orientation, language and communication skills and abstract thinking. It is one of the most challenging disorders both in terms of prevalence and economic burden. There are currently approximately 800,000 people with dementia in UK and national cost is 17 billion per year. It is estimated that in next thirty years, number of people with dementia will increase to 1.4 million and the national cost will be over 50 billion. The exceptional advances in modern medicine in terms of prolonging life expectancy do not necessarily improve the care delivered to people with dementia. Dementia is a progressive condition where clinical recovery is not possible despite the discovery of cognition enhancing drugs. This belief leads to low expectations that tend to erode hope and foster indignity. Advances in treatment of Alzheimer’s disease have, however, stimulated new thinking and methods of service delivery. At certain stage of their illness, if not from the very beginning, personal, and social recovery becomes more meaningful for service users than their clinical recovery. Objective: To investigate whether recovery-orientated psychiatric assessment and therapeutic intervention enhances the wellbeing of people with memory problems and their family carers. Method: This study was a preliminary randomised control study. Patients were randomly allocated to recovery focus group or treatment as usual group acting as the control. Participants in the recovery focus group received a recovery-focused pre-diagnostic wellbeing assessment and counselling, diagnostic consultation with written feedback and post-diagnostic support over a period of six months. Participants in both groups were assessed using the WHO Wellbeing Index (WHO-5) as the primary outcome measure. The Mini Mental State Examination, Cornell Scale for Depression in Dementia, EuroQol-5D and Zarit Burden Interview were used as secondary outcome measures. Written records of the narrative accounts of participants in the recovery focus group were also obtained. Results: 48 patients with early dementia were recruited and agreed to take part in the study. Out of these, 34 patients completed the study, of which 17 patients were in the recovery focus group and 17 patients were in the treatment as usual group (control).There was a significant difference between the groups in terms of greater improvement in wellbeing as rated by the WHO – 5 Wellbeing Index in the recovery focus group compared to the control group. The secondary outcome measures in the areas of cognition, quality of life and caregiver burden showed no differences between the groups. However, case histories from the recovery focus group identified the main areas of improvement in improved mood, increased social interaction, reduction in carer strain and/or burden and improved self-worth and/or confidence. Conclusions: This study shows that recovery focused care can enhance the wellbeing of people with mild to moderate dementia. The additional benefits perceived by the patients and their relatives /carers include improvement in mood symptoms, social interaction and confidence as well as reduction in carer burden and strain.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive, irreversible, neurodegenerative disease. The key to understanding AD is to elucidate the pathogenesis of neuron degeneration in specific brain regions.We hypothesize that there is increased DNA oxidation in AD brain compared to age-matched control subjects, especially in mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), and that the changes in DNA bases will affect protein expression in mitochondria and contribute to neurodegeneration in AD. To test this hypothesis:1) We quantified multiple oxidized bases in nuclear DNA (nDNA) and mtDNA of frontal, parietal, and temporal lobes and cerebellum from late-stage AD (LAD), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and age-matched control subjects using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry with selective ion monitoring (GC/MS-SIM). Also, we quantified oxidized DNA bases in cortex of APP/PS1 transgenic mice. (a) nDNA and mtDNA were extracted from eight LAD and eight control subjects. We found levels of multiple oxidized bases were significantly higher in frontal, parietal, and temporal lobes and that mtDNA had approximately 10-fold higher levels of oxidized bases than nDNA. Eight-hydroxyguanine was approximately 10-fold higher than other oxidized base adducts in both LAD and control subjects. These results suggest that oxidative damage to mtDNA may contribute to the neurodegeneration of AD. (b) Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), the phase between normal aging and early dementia, is a common problem in the elderly with many subjects going on to develop AD. Results from eight amnestic MCI and six control subjects suggest oxidative damage to DNA occurs in the earliest detectable phase of AD. (c) Analysis of nDNA from the cortex of four groups (3m, 6m, 9m, 12m) of APP/PS1 and wild type mice showed elevations of 8-hydroxyguanine in 12 month old APP/PS1 mice.2) To analyze mitochondrial protein changes in LAD, 2D gels were run to separate proteins and MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry was used to identify proteins.Five mitochondrial proteins were significantly decreased in LAD. This proteomic study provides a proteome map of mitochondria in LAD brain and an insight into the pathogenesis of neuron degeneration in Alzheimer's disease.

Dementia is increasingly recognized as a major and growing threat to public health worldwide, and there is a critical need for prevention and treatment strategies. However, it is necessary that appropriate methodologies are used in the identification of risk factors. The purpose of this dissertation research was to develop further the body of literature featuring Markov chains as an analytic tool for data derived from longitudinal studies of aging and dementia. Data drawn from 649 participants in the University of Kentucky’s Alzheimer’s Disease Center’s (UK ADC) Biologically Resilient Adults in Neurological Studies (BRAiNS) cohort, which was established in 1989 and follows adults age 60 years and older who are cognitively normal at baseline to death, were used to conduct three studies. The first study, “Mild cognitive impairment: Statistical models of transition using longitudinal clinical data,” shows that mild cognitive impairment is a stable clinical entity when a rigorous definition is applied. The second study, “Self-reported head injury and risk of cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s-type pathology in a longitudinal study of aging and dementia,” shows that when the competing risk of death is properly accounted for, self-reported head injury is a clear risk factor for late-life dementia and is associated with increased beta-amyloid deposition in the brain. The third study, “Incorporating prior-state dependence among random effects and beta coefficients improves multistate Markov chain model fit,” shows that the effect of risk factors, like age, may not be constant over time and may be altered based on the subject’s cognitive state and that model fit is significantly improved when this is taken into account.

The aim of the research presented in this thesis was to improve the characterisation of the changes in brain structure and function that occur at different stages of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) progression, from pre-symptomatic AD, to mild cognitive impairment (MCI), to clinically evident dementia, using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques. Baseline structural MRI data from a cohort of healthy older adults who were followed prospectively for ten years, during which time some developed MCI and some AD, were analysed. It was found that structural MRI could detect volume loss in medial-temporal lobes up to 7-10 years before clinical symptoms of AD appear. In addition, volumetric variability of medial-temporal regions detected by structural MRI across cognitively healthy older adults correlated with their performance on a task of visuospatial associative memory, and functional activation of the same regions occurred during successful performance of the same task on functional MRI (fMRI). Three groups of participants - cognitively healthy controls, people with MCI, and patients with probable AD - were then recruited and underwent a multimodal MRI protocol, which included functional sequences acquired at rest and during the execution of two different cognitive tasks (visuospatial associative memory and self-appraisal). Cross-sectional comparisons showed: (i) that successful visuospatial associative memory performance was associated with increased functional activity (measured with task fMRI) in lateral prefrontal regions in AD patients relative to controls and (ii) that increased functional activity overlapped with frontal brain networks showing increased functional connectivity (measured with resting fMRI) in the same AD patients. Further, by demonstrating group- and condition-specific decreased frontal activity in AD patients relative to controls during a self-appraisal fMRI task, it was shown the specific utility of fMRI to unravel cognitive mechanisms underlying specific neuropsychological symptoms such as unawareness of cognitive impairment (anosognosia) in MCI and AD. In conclusion, structural MRI can detect morphological changes in the preclinical stage of AD, possibly earlier than previously described, and these reliably match cognitive functioning in older adults. In the MCI and AD stages, once symptoms of cognitive impairment are clinically evident and measurable, task-related and resting functional MRI can inform on residual brain function detectable over and above the known changes in brain morphology and cognitive performance that have already occurred at these stages, emerging as a sensitive marker of residual ability that could potentially be used to measure the effect of new treatments.

Purpose: This study aimed to understand the effects of the Cognitive Orientation to daily Occupational Performance (CO-OP) on successful engagement in desired occupations (goals), health-related quality of life, and caregiver stress for individuals with Parkinson’s Disease (PD)-related cognitive impairment and their caregivers. Methods: A mixed methods single-subject design was used. Quantitative and qualitative data were combined to gain a comprehensive understanding of results. Results: Participants successfully engaged in all three trained goals and both untrained goals, generalized CO-OP strategies to perform trained goals outside of treatment sessions, and transferred CO-OP strategies to perform untrained goals independently. Conclusions: Individuals with PD-related cognitive impairment are capable of successfully engaging in self-selected treatment goals that are trained during CO-OP sessions, generalizing CO-OP strategies they have learned in treatment in order to perform the same goals outside of treatment, and transferring CO-OP strategies in order to perform untrained goals independently. / October 2016

Depressive symptoms are very common among people with neurocognitive disorder. The comorbidity of both diseases and the overlap of their symptoms complicates correct diagnosis and thus also the initiation of a correct treatment. The instruments of depression measuring in seniors with a severe cognitive deficit are also a discussed issue. The subject of the theoretical part is to describe the issue of depression and cognitive disorders in the old age with a focus on Alzheimer's disease, which is the most common mental disorder in the elderly together with depression. The goal of the empirical part of the thesis is to research based on the interviews with seniors if the most frequently used method of depression measuring in the elderly, Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS), is a suitable measuring instrument also in seniors with a cognitive deficit and further examine how these seniors actually experience the individual mood qualities which are the subjects of items in GDS. Forty seniors with a various degree of cognitive deficit participated in the research. The study results showed that the questionnaire is usable for seniors with a mild cognitive impairment and mild dementia. To detect the border of the cognitive deficit, below which it is not suitable to use the depression measuring method GDS, a...

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is neurodegenerative disorder that causes memory loss and cognitive dysfunction. It affects one in five people over the age of 80 and is distressing for both sufferers and their families. A transitional stage between normal ageing and dementia including AD is termed a mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Recent studies have shown that people with MCI may convert to AD over time although not all MCI cases progress to AD. Much research is now focussing on early detection of AD and diagnosing an MCI that will progress to AD to allow prompt treatment and disease management before the neurons degenerate to a stage beyond repair. Hence, the ability to obtain a method of identifying MCI is of great importance. Virtual reality plays an important role in healthcare and offers opportunities for detection of MCI. There are various studies that have focused on detection of early AD using virtual environments, although results remain limited. One significant drawback of these studies has been their limited capacity to incorporate levels of difficulty to challenge users' capability. Furthermore, at best, these studies have only been able to discriminate between early AD and healthy elderly with about 80% of overall accuracy. As a result, a novel virtual simulation called Virtual Reality for Early Detection of Alzheimer's Disease (VREAD) was developed. VREAD is a quick, easy and friendly tool that aims to investigate cognitive functioning in a group of healthy elderly participants and those with MCI. It focuses on the task of following a route, since Topographical Disorientation (TD) is common in AD. An investigation was set up with two cohorts: non-elderly and elderly participants. The findings with regard to the non-elderly are important as they represent a first step towards implementation with elderly people. The results with elderly participants indicate that this simulation based assessment could provide a method for the detection of MCI since significant correlations between the virtual simulation and existing neuropsychological tests were found. In addition, the results proved that VREAD is comparable with well-known neuropsychological tests, such as Cambridge Neuropsychological Automated Test Battery, Paired Associate Learning (CANTAB PAL) and Graded Naming Test (GNT). Furthermore, analysis through the use of machine learning techniques with regard to the prediction of MCI also obtained encouraging results. This novel simulation was able to predict with about 90% overall accuracy using weighting function proposed to discriminate between MCI and healthy elderly.

O transtorno cognitivo no idoso acarreta repercussões na sua vida, na família e na relação com a sociedade. Um instrumento de avaliação cognitiva amplamente utilizado é o MEEM - Mini Exame do Estado Mental - que é um teste de rastreamento com o objetivo de selecionar pessoas com provável déficit cognitivo. Uma amostra representativa da população de 394 idosos do município de Batatais SP foi avaliada através de inquérito domiciliar em relação às condições socioeconômicas e de saúde, e foi feito rastreamento dos sintomas depressivos e do desempenho cognitivo através de um instrumento baseado no MEEM. A maioria dos entrevistados era do sexo feminino (66%), sendo que 75,4% dos idosos pertenciam a uma faixa etária de 60-74 anos, chamada idoso jovem. Com relação à escolaridade a grande maioria (62.2%) cursou o primeiro grau. Com relação aos analfabetos 77,1% eram mulheres e 22,9% eram homens. Para o estado conjugal a diferença foi na proporção da viuvez 80.2% para o sexo feminino e 19.8% para o masculino. Quanto à renda familiar, 43.7% da população recebiam menos de 2,5 salários mínimos. Para avaliação do desempenho cognitivo usou um ponto de corte ? a 23 para o MEEM. Observou-se que 81.7% ficaram acima deste ponto e 18.3% ficaram abaixo. Os idosos que tiveram os escores mais elevados foram associados aos fatores como idade (60-69 anos), maior nível escolaridade, ter hábito de leitura, ter boa relação social principalmente com parentes, não ter hipertensão arterial, diabete, incontinência urinária, catarata e ausência de sintomas depressivos. / The cognitive impairment in the old has its effects on their lives, families and relationships with society. A widely used instrument of cognitive assessment is the MMSE- Mini Mental State - that is a screening test whose aim is to select people with probable cognitive deficiency. A significant sample of the population of 394 old people from Batatais - SP, was evaluated through a home survey considering the socioeconomic and health conditions and a screening of depressive symptoms and cognitive performance was done through an instrument based on MMSE. The great majority of people who were interviewed were female (66%) and 75.4% of the old belonged to an age group from 60 to 74 years old, being considered \"younger old\". Regarding scholarship, most of them had attended primary school (62.2%). Considering the illiterate 77.1% were women and 22.9% were men. Concerning marital status a huge difference between the proportion of widows (80.2%) and widowers (19.8%) was found. With reference to familiar income 43.7% of the population earned less than 2.5 minimum wages. To evaluate the cognitive performance a cut off ? 23 for MMSE was used. It was observed that 81.7% of the old were above and 18.3% were under this point. The old who achieved the highest scores had factors such as age (60-69 years old), better scholarship level, reading habits, a good social relationship (mainly with relatives), no high blood pressure, no diabetes, no urinary incontinence, no cataract and absence of depressive symptoms.

Introdução: O envelhecimento populacional vem sendo acompanhado por um aumento mundial na prevalência de demência. Entretanto, uma revisão sistemática da literatura evidenciou que pouco se sabe sobre a prevalência de demência e comprometimento cognitivo em populações etnicamente diferentes, como a indígena. Isto é, particularmente, relevante dado o aumento da expectativa de vida dessa população e, consequentemente, do número de idosos e das modificações em seu perfil de morbidade e mortalidade. Objetivo: Identificar a prevalência de comprometimento cognitivo na população indígena brasileira, caracterizando o perfil de desempenho cognitivo, de declínio cognitivo subjetivo e de humor e associando com fatores sociodemográficos, hábitos, antecedentes de saúde e humor. Método: Foram incluídos 217 indivíduos com idade igual a ou maior que 50 anos, de ambos os sexos, da etnia Mura, moradores da aldeia de Pantaleão, no município de Autazes, em Manaus - Amazonas. Os participantes foram submetidos a testes de avaliação de atenção, memória operacional, memória declarativa de curto e longo prazos, fluência verbal, habilidade visuoconstrutiva, bem como avaliação de humor, sintomas depressivos, declínio cognitivo subjetivo e desempenho funcional. Resultados: A prevalência de comprometimento cognitivo variou em função da faixa etária. A amostra total incluiu indivíduos com 50 anos de idade ou mais, a prevalência de comprometimento cognitivo foi 43,3%, nos participantes com 60 anos ou mais, a prevalência aumentou para 43,7% e para 51,1% naqueles com 65 anos ou mais. Em relação aos fatores associados, a idade e a escolaridade influenciaram as chances de comprometimento cognitivo em todas as faixas etárias. Nos participantes com 50 anos ou mais, a cada um ano de idade, aumenta em 3% a chance de comprometimento cognitivo (OR = 1,03), e a cada um ano de escolaridade esta chance diminui em 26% (OR = 0,74). Já nos participantes com 60 anos ou mais e nos com 65 anos ou mais, a cada um ano de idade, aumenta em 9% a chance de comprometimento cognitivo (OR = 1,09) e a cada um ano de escolaridade esta chance diminui em 29% (OR = 0,71). Além da idade e escolaridade, o IMC e a renda influenciaram a chance de comprometimento cognitivo nos participantes com idade 50 anos e 60 anos. A cada ponto no IMC, diminui em, aproximadamente, 10% a chance de comprometimento cognitivo (OR = 0,90). Em relação à renda, a cada unidade da renda familiar diminui em 48% a chance de comprometimento cognitivo nos idosos com idade 60 anos. Comparando com os indígenas sem comprometimento cognitivo, aqueles com comprometimento cognitivo tiveram pior desempenho em todos os testes cognitivos, exceto nos de fluência verbal e habilidade visuoconstrutiva, além de maior intensidade no declínio cognitivo subjetivo e nos sintomas depressivos (p 0,05). Conclusão: A prevalência de comprometimento cognitivo em adultos e indígenas aumenta nas faixas etárias maiores, e a chance de desenvolver algum comprometimento aumenta nos participantes mais velhos, com menor escolaridade e renda familiar. Estes achados podem contribuir para implementação de políticas públicas relacionadas ao cuidado da saúde do índio e à capacitação dos profissionais da saúde, incluindo a equipe de enfermagem, para identificação precoce de indivíduos vulneráveis ao desenvolvimento de comprometimento cognitivo. / Introduction: Population ageing has been accompanied by a worldwide increase in the pervasiveness of dementia. However, a systematic review of the literature shows that little is known about the prevalence of dementia and cognitive impairment among ethnically different, such as indigenous, populations. This is particularly relevant given the increase in life expectancy of this population and, consequently the number of elderly individuals, as well as the modification in their morbimortality profile. Objective: To identify the prevalence of cognitive impairment in the indigenous Brazilian population through an assessment of its cognitive performance profile, subjective cognitive decline and mood and associating it with sociodemographic factors, habits, health history and mood. Method: 217 individuals were included of equal to or greater than 50 years of age, of both sexes, of the Mura ethnic group, and residents of the Pantaleão village, in the municipality of Autazes, Amazonas. The participants were submitted to evaluation testing of attentiveness, operating memory, short-term and long-term declarative memory, verbal fluency, visual-constructional ability, as well as evaluation of mood, symptoms of depression, subjective cognitive decline and functional performance. Results: The prevalence of cognitive impairment varied according to age group. While in the total population sample, which included individuals 50 years of age and older, the prevalence of cognitive impairment was 43.3%, among participants 60 years or older, this prevalence increased to 43.7% and to 51.1% for those 65 years or older. In relationship to associated factors, age and schooling influenced the chances of cognitive impairment among all of the age groups. In participants of 50 years or older, for each year of age, there is a 3% increase in the chance of cognitive impairment (OR = 1,03) and for each year of schooling this chance diminishes by 26% (OR = 0,74). On the other hand, in participants of 60 years of age or more, for each year of age, there is a 9% increase in the chance of cognitive impairment (OR = 1,09) and for each year of schooling, this chance diminishes by 29% (OR = 0,71). Beyond age and schooling, the body mass index negatively influenced the chance of cognitive impairment in participants aged 50 years and 60 years. Beyond this, for each household income unit, there is a 48% decrease in the chance of cognitive impairment in the elderly participants aged 60 years. Compared with indigenous individuals without cognitive impairment, those with cognitive impairment performed worse on all cognitive tests, except those of verbal fluency and visual-constructional ability, besides a greater intensity of subjective cognitive decline and symptoms of depression (p 0.05). Conclusion: The prevalence of cognitive impairment in adults and indigenous individuals increases among older age groups and the chance of acquiring some kind of impairment increases among older participants with less schooling and lower household incomes. These findings can contribute to the implementation of public policies related to indigenous health care and the training of health professionals, including nursing teams, for the early identification of individuals vulnerable to the development of cognitive impairment.