Does an attentional and physical program improve walking adaptability in moderate dementia participants?

Abstract

Problem Statement: Falls are a critical problem for older adults. Beyond the functional consequences, they often lead to a significant loss of independence, increasing morbidity rates. Physical activity programs have proven effective in this regard. Moreover, particularly for individuals with moderate dementia, attentional and cognitive activity can slow the decline in overall health and the increase in dependence. Approach: A comparison was made between two groups of elderly people suffering from moderate dementia. One group followed a simple physical activity program for six months while another group followed a physical activity program associated with attentional exercises. A control group allows us to compare both experimental groups with lack of activity. Tinetti index, Time Up-and-Go test, stabilometric measures and walking evaluation have been compared among the groups to evaluate the different effects at the beginning of the experiment, after one, three and six months. Results: The results show significant improvement in both physical activity and physical and attentional activity groups relative to the control group. The increase in the average speed after the training program and stabilometric measures improvement, particularly the sway area of the dispersion of CoP positions, contribute to reduce fall risk. Moreover, beyond physical improvement, Tinetti test which is an evaluation of the fall risk in elderly individuals highlights significant improvement in the group with physical and attentional activities (from high risk to moderate risk). Conclusions: The different results of this experiment confirm the relevance of a dual-task training program associating functional and attentional capabilities and the requirement of regularity in the follow-up with the training program, particularly for participants with moderate dementia. Improvements were observed, with high or moderate effect size.