The effects of dementia partner programs using telephone on cognitive and neuropsychiatric symptoms in elderly persons with mild cognitive impairment: A randomized controlled trial

Abstract

Background/Objectives: To examine the effects of dementia partner programs on cognition, depression, and quality of life in elderly persons with mild cognitive impairment(MCI) residing in a community. Methods/Statistical analysis: In this study, 26 elderly persons with mild cognitive impairment were randomly assigned to an experimental group and a control group. The experimental group participated in a dementia partner program and a cognitive rehabilitation program, and the control group participated in the cognitive rehabilitation program for 10 weeks. MMSE-DS, and K-ACS were conducted with all subjects before and after the intervention in the same method. Findings: In the study results, a total of 23 subjects comprising 11 subjects in the experimental group and 12 in the control group were analyzed. The mean age was 79.91 ± 4.34 years. The experimental group showed significant improvement in the cognitive and self-esteem domains, while the control group showed a statistically significant improvement in the quality of life and self-esteem domains. Analysis of the variations by group indicated that the scores of all items showed positive effects in both groups while cognition and the quality of life showed statistically significant differences in the experimental group. Improvements/Applications: The service should be systemized so that no persons are alienated by individually providing treatment and training programs using telephone to elderly persons residing in a community.