Visuospatial Episodic Memory Impairment in Alzheimer’s Disease

سال انتشار: 1397
نوع سند: مقاله کنفرانسی
زبان: انگلیسی
مشاهده: 354

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شناسه ملی سند علمی:

NSMED01_058

تاریخ نمایه سازی: 5 آذر 1397

چکیده مقاله:

In comparison to other memory systems, episodic memory is more vulnerable to neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer (AD), which might affect the recall and recognition process of verbal, visual and spatial inputs. Among these impairments, visuospatial deficit in AD can appear at the early onset of the disease. The decline of this ability can cause difficulties in detecting orientation, perceiving the contrast and interfere with patients’ daily activates. Due to the critical role of visuospatial skills in performing everyday tasks, the purpose of the present study is to examine the visuospatial episodic memory impairment in Alzheimer patients. To fulfill the purpose of this cross-sectional study, a sample of 5 moderate and severe Alzheimer’s patients (3 male, 2 female), aged 65- 91 years (M=78.4, SD=10.57) were randomly chosen from the patients referred to a private neurology clinic in Mashhad, Iran and the control group comprised 5 healthy individuals (2 female, 3 male) aged 53 to 84 years (M=71.2, SD=11.69). Both groups were matched in terms of language (Persian), age, gender and years of education (M= 7.6 years, SD=1.51). The patient group had no other neurological disorders, drug and alcohol abuse and uncorrected visual or hearing impairments. The MMSE was used to evaluate the cognitive impairment; while the Benson Figure Test was used for appraising the visuospatial episodic performance. The Benson Figure Test is a simplified version of the Rey-Osterrieth figure and a well-known neuropsychological test for examining the visuospatial performance of memory by concentrating on both accuracy of design elements and their placement with no limit on response time. Compared to healthy controls, AD group was considerably impaired in all trials of the Benson Figure Test. The results of an independent sample T-test were as follows: (1) in copy trial, there was a significant difference in accuracy of the design elements (p-value=0.000, p < 0.05), in placement (p-value=0.000, p< 0.05), and in response time (p-value= 0.007, p< 0.05) between healthy control group and patient group, (2) in immediate recall trial, there was a significant difference in accuracy of the design elements (p-value=0.002, p< 0.05), in placement (p-value=0.001, p< 0.05), and in response time (p-value=0.018, p< 0.05) between both groups, and (3) in delayed recall trial, there was a significant difference in accuracy of the design elements (p-value=0.000, p< 0.05), in placement (p-value=0.000, p< 0.05), and in response time (p-value=0.007, p < 0.05) between both groups. The findings indicated that the AD group performed poorly in all parts of the three trials of the visuospatial test and their performance took more time than the healthy controls. Therefore, visuospatial episodic memory performance in neurodegenerative disorders demands more attention as well as verbal memory performance by clinicians and rehabilitation service providers.

نویسندگان

Sara Yazdani

PhD candidate, Linguistics department, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad

Mohsen Foroughipour

Professor of Neurology, Department of Neurology, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran