Effect of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Disease on Cognition
Effect of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Disease on Cognition
For subsequent analyses, 113 participants (3.4%) had to be excluded at baseline because they were younger than 75 (n = 40) or had dementia at baseline (n = 70) or incomplete neuropsychological testing (n = 3). After excluding those participants, the remaining sample consisted of 3,214 participants at baseline with a mean age of 79.7 ± 3.6 (range 75–98). Sample characteristics are shown in Table 1.
Age, education, and depressive symptoms explained the initial level of all three cognitive measures. Male sex and intake of psychotropic and other drugs that may affect cognition were related to poor initial test performance in word list immediate and delayed recall. A history of TIA or stroke went along with poor performance on the verbal fluency and word list immediate recall tasks; diabetes mellitus was solely related to test performance in verbal fluency.
Crucial to the slope of verbal fluency and word list immediate and delayed recall was age; the older the participants, the less their test performance increases were within 18 months. The slope of the word list immediate recall task was additionally inversely related to intake of psychotropic and other drugs that may affect cognition. (For estimates and p-values, see Table 2.) The model fit for all three cognitive outcomes can be regarded as reasonable (root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) 0.065–0.066).
Disease burden (number of the following diseases: hypertension, myocardial infarction or coronary heart disease, cardiac arrhythmia, TIA or stroke, diabetes mellitus) had no effect on rate of change on the verbal fluency task (estimate = −0.122, P = .20) or on the word list immediate (estimate = −0.129, P = .11) or delayed recall task (estimate = −0.016, P = .68). Here, a close model fit was achieved (RMSEA 0.047–0.052).
Results
For subsequent analyses, 113 participants (3.4%) had to be excluded at baseline because they were younger than 75 (n = 40) or had dementia at baseline (n = 70) or incomplete neuropsychological testing (n = 3). After excluding those participants, the remaining sample consisted of 3,214 participants at baseline with a mean age of 79.7 ± 3.6 (range 75–98). Sample characteristics are shown in Table 1.
Age, education, and depressive symptoms explained the initial level of all three cognitive measures. Male sex and intake of psychotropic and other drugs that may affect cognition were related to poor initial test performance in word list immediate and delayed recall. A history of TIA or stroke went along with poor performance on the verbal fluency and word list immediate recall tasks; diabetes mellitus was solely related to test performance in verbal fluency.
Crucial to the slope of verbal fluency and word list immediate and delayed recall was age; the older the participants, the less their test performance increases were within 18 months. The slope of the word list immediate recall task was additionally inversely related to intake of psychotropic and other drugs that may affect cognition. (For estimates and p-values, see Table 2.) The model fit for all three cognitive outcomes can be regarded as reasonable (root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) 0.065–0.066).
Disease burden (number of the following diseases: hypertension, myocardial infarction or coronary heart disease, cardiac arrhythmia, TIA or stroke, diabetes mellitus) had no effect on rate of change on the verbal fluency task (estimate = −0.122, P = .20) or on the word list immediate (estimate = −0.129, P = .11) or delayed recall task (estimate = −0.016, P = .68). Here, a close model fit was achieved (RMSEA 0.047–0.052).
