Remembering delayed intentions in patients with mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease.

Abstract

Prospective memory (PM) is the ability to remember intended actions and to evoke delayed intentions. It is a crucial skill in daily life functioning in the elderly and can be prematurely compromised in neurodegenerative processes. In the Latin American region, there are no established impartial metrics for its assessment. The purpose of this study is to explore PM in patients diagnosed with Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and Alzheimer's disease (AD). The specific objectives are to: to differentiate the performance of healthy subjects, patients with MCI, and patients with AD; to measure the relationship between PM and other cognitive test performance; and lastly, to analyze the internal consistency and inter-rater reliability of the Mini Cóndor Test, a brief PM assessment tool adapted for elderly patients with low-education levels The test only exist in Spanish. A comparative study of independent samples was conducted between 33 patients diagnosed with AD, 39 patients with MCI, and a control group of 33 healthy subjects. The results showed significant differences in the performance of PM, with the control group performing best, while the AD group had a significantly worse performance in the test than the MCI group. PM performance correlated significantly with retrospective memory and executive function. The Mini Cóndor Test yielded adequate indices for internal consistency and inter-rater reliability. This Test has the potential to detect cognitive impairment associated with neurodegenerative pathology at an early stage.