Grant: Master's Award: Canada Graduate Scholarships

The diagnosis of dementia is often preceded by a period of cognitive decline called Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), with impairments often observed in the domains of memory and executive function. It has been suggested that changes in health status may be used as predictors of cognitive decline. Previous studies have found that MCI is associated with increased incidence of diabetes, high body mass index and hypertension. However, there has been no single study examining a wide variety of physiological markers associated with MCI. Physiological markers of cognitive decline may have a great clinical utility as they are simple and non-invasive measures of biofunction that could be used in conjunction with other measures in developing screening tools for early intervention. The proposed study aims to investigate whether persons with MCI have a different pattern of cognitive and physiological change over time as compared to a group of healthy elderly controls. Measures used in this study will include blood pressure, hypertension, presence of diabetes, presence of depression, gait and balance, peak flow and grip strength. Based on previous studies, it is hypothesized that individuals with MCI will exhibit poorer performance on measures of physiological health, and will have greater decline on both measures of physiological functioning and cognitive abilities over time. Data for this project will come from the Victoria Longitudinal Study (VLS), a large-scale longitudinal sequential study of aging. Data from three points of testing, each separated by three years, will be examined. As the number of persons over the age of 65 continues to rise dramatically, with an accompanying increase in the number of persons with cognitive impairment, research investigating targets for early intervention are imperative for the health of the population. It is my goal to use my master's thesis research as a step in the identification of potential physiological markers of cognitive decline.