The effect of smartphone app‐based cognitive training on cognition in community‐dwelling elderly: A randomized controlled trial

Abstract

AbstractBackgroundMost of previous cognitive intervention studies provided group cognitive intervention for a short period of time, which are limited by requirement of money, time, and space in real clinical circumstances. Therefore, easily accessible way of cognitive training should be developed and tested in a large cohort of the elderly. We investigated the effectiveness of smartphone app (InBrain Trainer) based cognitive training for 12 months on cognitive improvement in the community‐dwelling healthy elderly.MethodThis App‐based Cognitive Training at Home (ACTH) study is a randomized, single‐masked, parallel group study, which was conducted between March 2018 to August 2019 at Gangnam Center for Dementia, in Seoul, South Korea. We recruited 389 healthy volunteers aged over 60 and they were randomly assigned to the intervention or control group. The intervention group experienced daily app‐based cognitive training at home (with regular feedback from administrator) and monthly group cognitive training for 12 months. All participants underwent cognitive screening test (CST) at baseline, 6 and 12 months. The primary outcome was the change in total composite score on CST, and the secondary outcomes included changes in composite scores of five cognitive domains, which were assessed using linear mixed effects models.ResultWhen the intervention‐by‐visit interaction effect was investigated, the intervention group showed a larger increase on total scores (p < 0.001 at 6 months, p = 0.001 at 12 months), on language (p <0.001 both at 6 and 12 months) and memory composite scores (p=0.006 at 6 months, p<0.001 at 12 months) compared to the control group. There was no significant difference in changes at 12 months in attention (p=0.72), visuospatial (p=0.994) and executive composite scores (p = 0.929) between the intervention and the control group. (Figure 1)ConclusionThis study demonstrated that app‐based cognitive training could enhance general cognition in the healthy elderly. Therefore, this cognitive training tool could be usefully utilized for the purpose of preventing cognitive decline on a community basis.