Spotting Cognitive Decline in Illiterate Elderly Chinese Women

Published on April 26, 2023

Imagine you’re a detective in a movie, trying to crack a case. In this case, your mission is to predict cognitive impairment risk in elderly illiterate Chinese women. To achieve this, researchers used a powerful tool called a prediction model. Just like how the detective gathers clues and evidence to uncover the truth, the scientists collected data from over 2,900 participants in two separate cohorts. They looked at variables such as age, cognitive function, waist-to-height ratio, psychological score, daily living activities, instrumental abilities, and tooth brushing frequency. By analyzing this information using fancy math called Cox regression, they were able to construct a model that accurately predicts the risk of cognitive impairment. The model performed well in both internal and external validation tests, with high area under the curve (AUC) values. This means it’s an effective tool for identifying elderly illiterate women in China who are at higher risk of cognitive decline. It’s like having a superpowered magnifying glass to zoom in on those at risk! If you’re interested in learning more about this fascinating research, click the link below to dive deeper into the details.

ObjectiveTo establish and validate a targeted model for the prediction of cognitive impairment in elderly illiterate Chinese women.Methods1864 participants in the 2011–2014 cohort and 1,060 participants in the 2014–2018 cohort from the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS) were included in this study. The Chinese version of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) was used to measure cognitive function. Demographics and lifestyle information were collected to construct a risk prediction model by a restricted cubic spline Cox regression. The discrimination and accuracy of the model were assessed by the area under the curve (AUC) and the concordance index, respectively.ResultsA total of seven critical variables were included in the final prediction model for cognitive impairment risk, including age, MMSE score, waist-to-height ratio (WHtR), psychological score, activities of daily living (ADL), instrumental abilities of daily living (IADL), and frequency of tooth brushing. The internal and external validation AUCs were 0.8 and 0.74, respectively; and the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves indicated good performance ability of the constructed model.ConclusionA feasible model to explore the factors influencing cognitive impairment in elderly illiterate women in China and to identify the elders at high risk was successfully constructed.

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