Abstract
Background
Everyday functioning becomes a challenge with aging, particularly among frail oldest-old adults. Several factors have been identified as influencing everyday activities realization, including physical and cognitive functioning. However, the influence of cognitive resources as a compensatory factor in the context of physical frailty deserves further consideration.
Aims
This study aims to investigate in older adults physically frail the possible compensatory role of cognitive resources to perform everyday tasks.
Methods
Two groups of community-dwelling old participants (n = 26 per group) matched for their age and cognitive resources, have been drawn according to their level of physical functioning. Two measures of everyday functioning have been assessed: one self-reported by the participant (the IADL scale) and one performance-based measure (the TIADL tasks).
Results
Participants performed equally the TIADL tasks irrespective of their physical condition. Contrariwise, participants with low physical functioning reported more everyday difficulties than their counterparts with a high level of physical functioning. Additionally, regressions analyses revealed differential influence of cognitive resources on performance and reported measures of everyday functioning.
Discussion
Our data suggests that cognitive resources are more strongly involved in the performance-based IADL measure in situation of physical frailty. Additionally, for participants with low physical functioning, lower cognitive resources are associated with more perceived difficulties in everyday life.
Conclusion
These results highlight the compensatory role of cognitive resources in physically frail older adults, and suggest that an overestimation of everyday difficulties compared to performance on IADL tasks is an early indicator of physical decline and cognitive compensation.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
The authors are very grateful to the services of UDCCAS Gironde that allowed them access to the elderly.
Funding
This work was supported by the National French Institute of Informatics and Mathematics (Inria), the Public funds Conseil Régional d’Aquitaine, CNSA (Caisse Nationale de la Solidarité pour l’Autonomie), Conseil Départemental de la Gironde, and CARSAT Aquitaine (Caisse d’Assurance Retraite et de la Santé au Travail) and the Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale (Grant number: DOC20161136217; PI: Sauzéon).
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Dupuy, L., N’Kaoua, B., Dehail, P. et al. Role of cognitive resources on everyday functioning among oldest-old physically frail. Aging Clin Exp Res 32, 2021–2029 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-019-01384-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-019-01384-3