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Learning Objective 1: we examined whether this scale can be applied to the assessment of the degree of cognitive dysfunction in patients with Alzheimer’s disease.
Learning Objective 2: The learner will be able to assessment of the degree of cognitive dysfunction in patients with Alzheimer’s disease by care staffs.
Objective: Suzuki (we) developed the scale of Daily Cognition and Behavior for Alzheimer’s disease (DCB-AD), which consists of 8 factors including ”Understanding of the location of residence”,”Judgement of situation”,”Expression of truble”,”Interruption of act”,”Spatial awareness”,”Identification with body”,”Relation to others”, and ”Recognition of family”, itemized to 24 points in 2009. In the present study, we examined whether this scale can be applied to the assessment of the degree of cognitive dysfunction in patients with Alzheimer’s disease by care staffs which have not medical-related licenses.
Methods: Two-hundred and forty patients in “Fee-Based Home for the Elderly” were enrolled in this study. The same number of care-staffs as the patients numbers counted scores of DCB-AD as well as those of OLD(Development and validation of Observation List for early signs of Dementia). Patients’ age and sex were also recorded. Changes in the scores over years for 2008 to 2010 were analyzed by Friedman’s χ2 r-test followed by Wilcoxon t-test with Bonferroni correction.
Results: The cognitive activity in patients was significantly decreased from 2008 to 2010 year by year (p<0.001), which was consistent with the results obtained from OLD scores (p<0.045).
Conclusion: Our findings indicate that DCB-AD, a newly developed scoring system, seems to have some usefulness for the assessment of Alzheimer’s cognitive dysfunction by care staff.
See more of: World Academy of Nursing Science: Oral Paper & Posters