The Prevalence of Cognitive Impairment in Famagusta-North Cyprus Residents Over 65 Years of Age

Abstract

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Dementia is one of the major causes of disability and dependency among elderly and the fifth cause of death worldwide. With screening and identifying disease at early stages, new treatment plans and specific care in patients' lives overall benefit society in financial and social aspects. The main aim of this study is to detect prevalence of cognitive impairment (CI) among Famagusta residents in North Cyprus aged 65 and above, and also to identified its associate risk factors.MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study is a population based, cross-sectional study. Simple random sampling was applied to the population. Sample size was calculated as 143. Along with demographics involving risk factors of dementia, CI was assessed by the Mini-Mental State Examination and Mini Cog Test scores. Daily life activity impairment was evaluated with Functional Activities Questionnaire and depression with Short Geriatric Depression Scale. SPSS was used for analysis and chi-square was used for hypothesis test (p<0.05).RESULTS: In total,135 participants were included in analysis from 4 age groups (65-69/70-74/75-79/80+). The mean age of the participants was 73.17 +/- 6.421 and females comprised 70.4%. Overall, 40% of the whole population had CI and 20.7% had depression. It was observed to be more frequent among older age groups (p<0.001) and females (p=0.007). Lower education was found to be associated with CI and 60.8% of individuals with 6 or less years of education had CI (p=0.011).CONCLUSION: This study has shown that prevalence of CI, including MCI and possible dementia cases are quite high. Considering the growing elderly population, cognitive screening tests and preventive measures of modifiable risk factors are required as public health measures.