Relationship between cognitive impairment and functional disability in nursing home residents

Abstract

Introduction: Cognitive abilities are defined as the awareness of immediate discovering, rediscovering, and recognizing information in various forms, understanding, and comprehension. Objective: To examine the cognitive impairment rate and its effect on the functional status of elderly persons, retirement home beneficiaries. Method: The research has been designed as a cross-sectional study, including 110 elderly persons. Research instruments comprised a general questionnaire, Katz index of independence in activity of daily living, Lawton instrumental activities of everyday life, and Mini-mental state examination. The statistical test used was the ch2 test, while Pearson's correlation analysis was used for correlation analysis. Results: Out of the total number of subjects, 60% had an impaired cognitive status. When it comes to functional status, assistance was necessary for 79.2% of the subjects. Statistically significant weak positive correlation existed between the subjects' cognitive status and their functional abilities (r = 0.331; p<0.001; r = 0.386; p<0.001). Conclusion: The cognitive deficit rate was high in the retirement home subjects. Cognitive deficit brings about a significant decline intellectual functioning and undermines the subjects' daily living activities.

Keywords

• elderly persons
• functional status
• cognitive deficit