Comparing the Performance of Healthy Elderly and Individuals with Dementia of the Alzheimer Type in Bender Geshtalt Test and Mini Mental State Examination

Senescence is a global phenomenon. Alzheimer's disease is one of the most important neurologic diseases in the old age which causes progressive deterioration in cognitive functions in addition to mood, personality, judgment and behavioral alterations. Since this disease imposes many emotional and financial costs on the patients and carers, the diagnosis in the early stages can reduce the consequences. Therefore, the present study aimed to compare the performance of healthy elderly and the elderly with the Alzheimer's disease in Bender Geshtalt Test and Mini-Mental State Examination. The study was an ex post facto type research. The sample consisted of 60-90 year-old elderly living in the nursing homes of Tehran: 50 healthy elderly and 50 elderly with A.D. They were selected by available sampling. The data were collected through Bender Gestalt Test as well as Mini-Mental State Examination and analysed by using t-independent test and multivariate analysis. The results of Mini-Mental State Examination indicated that there is a significant difference between 2 groups in orientation of time, orientation of place, registration, recent memory, repeat, reading, attention and calculation, comprehension, writing and drawing. No significant difference was observed in naming. The findings of Bender Gestalt Test showed significant differences in rotation, fragmentation, preservation, collision, impotence, difficulty in closure, motor incoordination, angulation, cohesion,simplification,and retrogression. Within the parameters of time and overlapping shapes there was no significant difference between the two groups. The lower scores in MMSE and more errors in Bender Gestalt Test in the elderly with A.D show brain damage and regression to lower level of developmental stages (p=0.05).