A Longitudinal Posthumous Study of Letter Writing in a Late Elderly Case

This study is a posthumous longitudinal study of consecutive letters written by an elderly woman from age 89 to 93. Findings reveal a consistent linguistic performance during the first 3 years, supporting “normal” status for late elderly writing. She produced clearly written cursive form, intact semantic content, and minimal spelling and stroke errors. A decline in writing was observed in the last 6–9 months of the study and an analysis revealed production of clausal fragmentation, decreasing semantic clarity, and a higher frequency of spelling, semantic, and stroke errors. Analysis of writing samples can be a valuable tool in documenting a change in cognitive status differentiated from normal late aging.

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NIH Impairment in recognition memory performance as a correlate of cognitive status in the Baltimore longitudinal study of aging

Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology ◽

10.1016/0887-6177(91)90048-e ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 6 (3) ◽

pp. 183

Keyword(s):

Longitudinal Study ◽

Recognition Memory ◽

Memory Performance ◽

Cognitive Status ◽

Recognition Memory Performance ◽

Baltimore Longitudinal Study

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Cognitive function and type of physical activity: results from the FRéLE longitudinal study

European Journal of Public Health ◽

10.1093/eurpub/ckz185.640 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 29 (Supplement_4) ◽

Author(s):

C Dupré ◽

D Hupin ◽

C Goumou ◽

F Béland ◽

F Roche ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Physical Activity ◽

Longitudinal Study ◽

Cognitive Decline ◽

Cognitive Disorders ◽

Cognitive Status ◽

Professional Activity ◽

Domestic Activity ◽

Different Types ◽

The Impact

Abstract Background Previous cohorts have been notably criticized for not studying the different type of physical activity and not investigating household activities. The objective of this work was to analyse the relation between physical activity and cognitive decline in older people living in community. Impact of type of physical activity on the results has been realised. Methods The study used data from the longitudinal and observational study , FrèLE (FRagility: Longitudinal Study of Expressions). The collected data included: socio-demographic variables, lifestyle, and health status (frailty, comorbidities, cognitive status, depression). Cognitive decline was assessed by using: MMSE (Mini-Mental State Examination)and MoCA (Montreal Cognitive Assessment). Physical activity was assessed by the PASE (Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly). This tool is structured in three sections: the leisure activity, the domestic activity and the professional activity. Logistic regressions and proportional hazards regression models (Cox) were used to estimate the risk of cognitive disorders. Results At baseline, the prevalence of cognitive disorders was 6.9% according to MMSE. In total, 1326 participants without cognitive disorders were included in the analysis. The mean age was 77.4 years, and 52.1% of the participants were women. After a 2 years long follow-up, we found cognitive disorders on 92 participants (6.9%). Physical activity at baseline is lower in older adults for whom cognitive decline was observed after two years of follow-up. Subclass analyses showed that leisure and domestic activities were associated to cognitive decline, but not professional activities. Conclusions Analysis showed a relationship between cognitive disorders and type of physical activity. The current study will be completed by the MoCA for mild cognitive impairment. These findings compared to other ongoing studies will contribute to the debate on the beneficial effects of physical activity on cognition. Key messages The work allowed us to analyze the link between the different types of physical activity and mild to severe cognitive disorders. The aim is to put in place preventive policies of aging. The work allowed us to see the effect of the different types of physical activity and the impact of the statistical method on the results.

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Validation of neuropsychological tests for the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol

International Psychogeriatrics ◽

10.1017/s1041610219000693 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 31 (12) ◽

pp. 1709-1719 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Qinqin Meng ◽

Huali Wang ◽

John Strauss ◽

Kenneth M. Langa ◽

Xinxin Chen ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Longitudinal Study ◽

Episodic Memory ◽

Functional Status ◽

Cognitive Assessment ◽

Rating Scale ◽

Cognitive Status ◽

Clinical Dementia Rating ◽

Community Screening ◽

Assessment Protocol ◽

Neurocognitive Tests

ABSTRACTObjective:To compare and validate neurocognitive tests in the Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol (HCAP) for the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS), and to identify appropriate tests to be administered in future waves of CHARLS.Methods:We recruited 825 individuals from the CHARLS sample and 766 subjects from hospitals in six provinces and cities in China. All participants were administered the HCAP-neurocognitive tests, and their informants were interviewed regarding the respondents’ functional status. Trained clinicians administered the Clinical Dementia Rating scale (CDR) to assess the respondents’ cognitive status independently.Results:The testing protocol took an average of 58 minutes to complete. Refusal rates for tests of general cognition, episodic memory, and language were less than 10%. All neurocognitive test scores significantly correlated with the CDR global score (correlation coefficients ranged from 0.139 to 0.641). The Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) - telephone interview for cognitive status (TICS), community screening instrument for dementia (CSI-D) for respondent, episodic memory and language tests each accounted for more than 20% of the variance in global CDR score (p < 0.001) in bivariate tests. In the CHARLS subsample, age and education were associated with neuropsychological performance across most cognitive domains, and with functional status.Conclusion:A brief set of the CHARLS-HCAP neurocognitive tests are feasible and valid to be used in the CHARLS sample and hospital samples. It could be applied in the future waves of the CHARLS study, and it allows estimating the prevalence of dementia in China through the population-based CHARLS.

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NIH Impairment in recognition memory performance as a correlate of cognitive status in the Baltimore longitudinal study of aging

Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology ◽

10.1093/arclin/6.3.183 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 6 (3) ◽

pp. 183-183

Author(s):

P. T. Costa ◽

C. H. Kawas ◽

A. B. Zonderman

Keyword(s):

Longitudinal Study ◽

Recognition Memory ◽

Memory Performance ◽

Cognitive Status ◽

Recognition Memory Performance ◽

Baltimore Longitudinal Study

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Printing Tibetan Epistolaria: A Bibliographical Analysis of Epistolary Transformations from Manuscript to Xylograph

The Journal of Epistolary Studies ◽

10.51734/jes.v2i1.26 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 2 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Christina Kilby

Keyword(s):

Semantic Content ◽

Letter Writing ◽

Woodblock Printing ◽

Epistolary Texts ◽

Editorial Decisions ◽

And Function ◽

Paper Format ◽

The Way

In Tibetan tradition, letter writing is a sophisticated art in which the material aspects of a letter––paper format, script style and size, text spacing and layout––are integral to the letter's semantic content. What meaning is lost and gained in the transformation from manuscript original to printed edition? What scribal and editorial decisions are at play in this textual transformation? My aims in this article are twofold: to introduce scholars of global epistolary literatures to the Tibetan epistolary tradition, and to examine the ways in which editing and printing epistolaria can thoroughly transform letters’ materiality and meaning. This study not only contributes a bibliographical analysis of printed Tibetan epistolaria, but also offers a model for investigating how woodblock printing or other printing technologies can change the way epistolary texts both look and function.

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