The cognitive status and its relationship with some demographic characteristics of the elderly under hemodialysis

With rising age and the beginning of old age, people gradually lose some of their physiological and psychosocial functions. Any approach that can reduce the negative effects of age on cognitive status or reduce the risk of dementia will have a dramatic effect on the quality of life of the elderly. The aim of this study was to determine the cognitive status and its relationship with some demographic characteristics in the elderly under the hemodialysis of medical centers of Guilan University of Medical Sciences.

This cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on 84 elderly people under hemodialysis in 2019. Data were collected using a demographic characteristics questionnaire and Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) test whose validity and reliability have been confirmed in the national studies and then were analyzed through descriptive statistics (frequency tables, mean and standard deviation) and analytical statistics (chi-square, Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis) using SPSS 20, considering the significant level of 0.05.

The findings showed that the majority of the elderly under the hemodialysis (64.3%) had mild cognitive impairment. Among the dimensions of the test, the dimension of orientation with the mean score and standard deviation of 9.04 ±1.689 had the highest share; and the construction dimension with the mean score and standard deviation of 0.62 ±0.488 had the lowest share in cognitive status of these patients. The findings also indicated a significant difference between the cognitive status and some demographic characteristics of the elderly under hemodialysis (gender, educational level, marital status and underlying disease) (P < 0.001).

According to the findings of this study, the cognitive status of the elderly under hemodialysis is affected by some demographic characteristics such as gender, level of education, marital status and underlying disease. Awareness of the results of this research can be considered by the authorities to provide the necessary background to improve the cognitive status of the elderly through planning and providing the necessary arrangements.