Improvement of cognitive function after paper‐based cognitive training intervention in early‐stage Alzheimer's disease

Abstract

AbstractBackgroundCognitive training refers to cognitive exercises with inherent challenges that target enhance performance in specific cognitive domain. There has been number of studies reported positive outcome of cognitive training in persons with Alzheimer's disease. In this study, we newly designed set of paper‐based cognitive training program, "Gipum‐seo" which consists of different levels of difficulty using predesigned exercises and evaluated its efficacy of cognitive enhancement on patients with early stage of Alzheimer's disease.MethodForty participants who are diagnosed with early stage of Alzheimer’s dementia participated in this study. To test the efficacy of paper‐based cognitive training programs to cognition, all patients were randomly allocated to either an intervention group (n=20) or a control group (n=20). The intervention group regularly received 24 sessions of paper‐based cognitive training, over a 12 week period. Neuropsychological examinations were conducted before and after this training period.ResultAfter 12 weeks, the intervention group showed a significant change in Korean version of the Mini‐Mental State Examination (25.90±3.8), compared to the control group (23.7±2.8) (p=0.04). Also, there was significant improvement in language, attention and executive function for the training group, as compared with controls.ConclusionPaper‐based cognitive training might have beneficial effects on the general cognitive functions in early stage of Alzheimer’s dementia.