A relação entre qualidade de vida e funções cognitivas em idosos tem sido pouco estudada. O objetivo deste estudo foi examinar a associação entre qualidade de vida, cognição e desempenho nas funções executivas de idosos. O estudo teve a participação de 88 idosos. Utilizou-se o método amostral de conveniência. Todos os participantes responderam sobre condições sociodemográficas, qualidade de vida (World Health Organization Quality of Life Group-Bref), funções cognitivas (Mini-Exame do Estado Mental e Instrumento de Avaliação Neuropsicológica Breve) e funções executivas (Teste Wisconsin de Classificação de Cartas). Os dados mostraram associações importantes entre os domínios de qualidade de vida Físico e Meio Ambiente e variáveis cognitivas, o que reforça a importância da cognição tanto na manutenção de cuidados físicos, quanto nas oportunidades de o idoso adquirir novas informações e habilidades no meio em que vive.

Along with cognitive disorders, depression has been a concern for mental health services due to its highly debilitating effect on the functioning and quality of life of the elderly. However, there is still little understanding of the cognitive alterations resulting from depression or of the difficult differential diagnosis with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). It is known that performance on cognitive tests is strongly influenced by education but few studies have been conducted involving low-educated populations.Objective: To evaluate the performance of elders with low education and no dementia on Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-Revised (ACE-R) test and its cognitive domains, and compare patients with Current Major Depressive Episode (CMDE) against those without depressive symptoms. Methods:A retrospective, cross-sectional analytical study was conducted based on medical files of patients treated at the Cerebral Aging Clinic of the Hospital São Lucas of the PUCRS. The study included 116 individuals with low education (< 8 years of education) aged between 60 and 84 (69.6 ± 6.4) years, with MCDE (N = 41) and controls (N = 75). Results:No significant difference was observed between control and MCDE groups in median scores on the ACE-R, Mini-Mental State Examination, and the five cognitive domains. There was also no difference between the groups on separate analyses of results on the clock drawing test, the categorical verbal and phonological fluency test, and the naming test. Conclusion:The results of this study showed that depressive symptoms did not influence scores on the ACE-R tests conducted in elders with low education.