Impaired abstract thinking may discriminate between normal aging and vascular mild cognitive impairment

• Autor(a) principal: Sudo,Felipe Kenji
• Data de Publicação: 2010
• Outros Autores: Alves,Gilberto Sousa, Alves,Carlos Eduardo de Oliveira, Lanna,Maria Elisa, Ericeira-Valente,Letice, Moreira,Denise Madeira, Engelhardt,Eliasz, Laks,Jerson
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Arquivos de neuro-psiquiatria (Online)
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0004-282X2010000200005
• topic: CAMCOG; elderly; mild cognitive impairment; vascular dementia; cerebrovascular disease; abstract thinking

OBJECTIVE: Cerebrovascular disease (CVD) is associated with cognitive deficits. This cross-sectional study examines differences among healthy elderly controls and patients with vascular mild cognitive impairment (VaMCI) and vascular dementia (VaD) in performances on CAMCOG subscales. METHOD: Elderly individuals (n=61) were divided into 3 groups, according to cognitive and neuroimaging status: 16 controls, 20 VaMCI and 25 VaD. VaMCI and VaD individuals scored over 4 points on the Hachinski Ischemic Scale. RESULTS: Significant differences in total CAMCOG scores were observed across the three groups (p<0.001). VaD subjects performed worse than those with VaMCI in most CAMCOG subscales (p<0.001). All subscales showed differences between controls and VaD (p<0.001). Performance on abstract thinking showed difference between VaMCI and controls (p<0.001). CONCLUSION: CAMCOG discriminated controls from VaMCI and VaD. Assessment of abstract thinking may be useful as a screening item for diagnosis of VaMCI.