Diapositiva 1

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Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León Hospital
Universitario Dr. José E. González Servicio de
Geriatría
Cognitive Decline and Geriatric Assessment in a
Mexican University Geriatric Unit
Gámez Daniel M.D. González Blanca M.N. Salinas
Ricardo M.D.
Presented on July 8th 2009 IAGG Congress Paris
2009 Introduction Cognitive decline has been
associated with several diseases during the
ageing process, for primary care clinicians there
are some barriers to evaluate an elderly patient
using the MMSE screening test, due to the
multiple pathologies that have been involved.
  Methods and Materials This is an
observational and retrospective analysis from the
database obtained during a 6 month period in the
Geriatric Unit of the University Hospital
U.A.N.L. we analyzed 1311 ambulatory patients
over 60 years of age from February to July 2008
and a MMSE evaluation was carried out during the
first visit. A frequency and Chi square tests
were performed using SPSS 13.   Results We
obtained 372 males, 936 females, the mean of age
was 75.97 years old and 4.44 the mean of level of
education. The correlation showed depression and
dementia as the principal cause of cognitive
decline. Depression was a frequent diagnosis in
all processes of cognitive decline with 139
patients (36.1) in MMSE 26-30, 81 (35.4) in
MMSE 22 to 25, 117 (45.5) with MMSE 17-21, 124
(46.6) and finally 47 (55.3) in MMSE 0 to 10.
Alzheimers disease was the most frequent
diagnosis of dementia and its prevalence
increased during the cognitive decline process 9
patients (2.5) with MMSE 26 to 30, 9 (3.9) with
MMSE 22-25, 37 (14.4) with MMSE 17-21, 85
(31.8) with MMSE 11-16 and 35 (41.2) with MMSE
0-10.   Conclusion MMSE is a screening test in
the geriatric assessment and can be used by
medical practitioners to evaluate cognitive
decline but never to diagnose or to start
treatment. The patients may be sent to
specialized centers for the memory study to
improve the diagnosis quality and intervention.