Is heart failure associated with cognitive impairment in elderly?

• Published in: Human & veterinary medicine Vol. 10; no. 3; pp. 122 - 127
• Main Authors: Neculicioiu, Vlad, Paşca, Sergiu, Azamfirei, Bianca A, Vesa, Ştefan C, Sava, Mădălina, Vlaicu, Sonia I, Macarie, Antonia E
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cluj-Napoca Bioflux SRL 01-09-2018
• Subjects: Activities of daily living; Age; Anemia; Anticoagulants; Cardiovascular disease; Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive ability; Dementia; Diabetes; Geriatrics; Heart diseases; Heart failure; Hypertension; Mortality; Older people; Patients; Questionnaires; Software; Statistical analysis; Statistics; Systematic review
• ISSN: 2066-7655; 2066-7663

Aim: The aim of this study was to find an association between heart failure (HF) and cognitive impairment in geriatric patients. Also, the association of other parameters with cognitive impairment was followed.Material and methods: The study included 95 patients with the median age of 82 (78; 85) years, from which 25 (26.3%) did not have HF and 70 (73.7%) with HF. Cognitive evaluation was performed using the MMSE questionnaire. Results: Statistical analysis was conducted to assess the variables associated with the patient's cognitive impairment. Age presented a negative correlation of low power and statistical significance with the MMSE score (r=-0.249; p=0.01). The MMSE score was higher in patients without anemia (p=0.039) compared to those with anemia. The MMSE score was higher in the anticoagulant group compared to the no anticoagulant group (p=0.043). Other associations did not reach statistical significance. Conclusions: We did not find an association between HF and cognitive impairment. We demonstrated an inverse correlation between the age of the patients and MMSE values, we determined that anemia is a risk factor for presence of cognitive impairment and we demonstrated the protective effect of anticoagulant therapy on the development of cognitive impairment.