Cognitively-Related Basic Activities of Daily Living Impairment Greatly Increases the Risk of Death in Alzheimers Disease.

ABSTRACT:

Introduction

Some Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients die without ever developing cognitively impaired basic activities of daily living (basic ADL), which may reflect slower disease progression or better compensatory mechanisms. Although impaired basic ADL is related to disease severity, it may exert an independent risk for death. This study examined the association between impaired basic ADL and survival of AD patients, and proposed a multistate approach for modeling the time to death for patients who demonstrate different patterns of progression of AD that do or do not include basic ADL impairment.

Methods

1029 patients with probable AD at the Baylor College of Medicine Alzheimer's Disease and Memory Disorders Center met the criteria for this study. Two complementary definit

SUBMITTER: Liang FW 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5003345 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature