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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Detereminants of capacity to consent to research on Alzheimer's Disease | | Author(s) | Barton W Palmer, Alexandrea L Harmell, Luz L Pinto |
| Journal title | Clinical Gerontologist, vol 40, no 1, January-February 2017 |
| Publisher | Taylor and Francis, January-February 2017 |
| Pages | pp 24-34 |
| Source | http://www.tandfonline.com |
| Keywords | Dementia ; Mental disorder ; Cognitive processes ; Rights [elderly] ; Social ethics ; Evaluation ; United States of America. |
| Annotation | Investigators conducting Alzheimer's disease (AD) research need to consider participants' capacity to consent. Cognitive functioning is a significant predictor of decisional capacity, but there is a dearth of information on the influence of neuropsychiatric symptoms in AD on decisional capacity. The authors examined the rates of decisional capacity associated with two types of research protocols, and the association of capacity with neuropsychiatric symptoms and other participant characteristics. They comprehensively evaluated the decisional capacity of 64 patients with mild-to-moderate AD and 70 healthy comparison (HC) subjects randomised, to consider either a medium risk or higher risk hypothetical research protocol. Additional measures included sociodemographics, cognitive deficits, and neuropsychiatric symptoms. Twenty AD patients (31.3%) and 67 HCs (95.7%) were deemed capable; 44 AD patients (68.8%) and 3 HCs (4.3%) were incapable of consent. Age, education and severity of cognitive deficits were associated with incapable status. There were no significant associations with severity of neuropsychiatric symptoms or protocol risk level. The findings highlight the importance of understanding of capacity and its assessment among people with AD, rather than treating AD diagnosis as synonymous with impaired capacity. As novel treatments move from bench to bedside, methods of assessing and addressing capacity impairment must similarly advance. Individuals should be encouraged to execute research proxy documents when the are still able to do so. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-171124201 A |
| Classmark | EA: E: DA: IKR: TQ: 4C: 7T |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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