Lower Gait Speed in Older Women with Dementia Compared with Controls

Abstract

Movement time is increased in patients with Alzheimer’s disease. Objectives: To study differences in movement time and ability to increase speed in older women with dementia. Methods: Four tests were performed at self-selected and maximal speed: walking 2 ×15 m, walking between parallel lines, ‘get up and go’ (GUG) and rising from lying supine. Twenty-two patients and 22 controls (mean ages 81 and 86 years, respectively) were included in the study. Results: In the groups over 80 years, walking and GUG at both speeds and rising from lying supine from the left at self-selected speed were significantly slower among patients (20–30%). Both patients and controls were able to increase movement speed when changing from self-selected to maximal speed (13–27%). Patients with Alzheimer’s disease had lower self-selected walking speed compared with patients with other types of dementia (p = 0.048). Conclusion: Testing physical performance in two different speeds was feasible in patients with dementia. Patients had slower gait speed and were slower in the functional tests, such as GUG, but the capacity to increase speed seemed intact.

Measuring physical function in people with dementia: a psychometric investigation

“…The remaining eleven studies were cross sectional in nature (Alencar et al, 2012;Blankevoort et al, 2013;Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005;Fox, Henwood, et al, 2014a;McGough et al, 2013;Nordin, Rosendahl, & Lundin-Olsson, 2006;Ries et al, 2009;Suttanon et al, 2011;Tappen et al, 1997;V. Thomas & Hageman, 2002;Wittwer et al, 2008).…”

“…Thomas & Hageman, 2002;Wittwer et al, 2008). Four studies only examined one psychometric property (Alencar et al, 2012;Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005;Tappen et al, 1997; V. Thomas & Hageman, 2002), three of these studies examined reliability; all three with intra-rater reliability, with one study also extending their analysis to inter-rater reliability. The final study measured construct validity, specifically hypothesis testing (Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005).…”

“…Four studies only examined one psychometric property (Alencar et al, 2012;Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005;Tappen et al, 1997; V. Thomas & Hageman, 2002), three of these studies examined reliability; all three with intra-rater reliability, with one study also extending their analysis to inter-rater reliability. The final study measured construct validity, specifically hypothesis testing (Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005). Eight studies examined two psychometric properties (Blankevoort et al, 2013;Fox, Henwood, et al, 2014a;McGough et al, 2013;Nordin et al, 2006;Ries et al, 2009;Sterke et al, 2010;Suttanon et al, 2011;Wittwer et al, 2008).…”

“…This is typical of studies into dementia due to the gender specific increased risk of dementia (AIHW, 2012). Five studies were specific to the aetiology of dementia; three studies limited participants to AD only (Ries et al, 2009;Suttanon et al, 2011;Tappen et al, 1997;Wittwer et al, 2008), one study to AD or Vascular Dementia (Alencar et al, 2012) and one study to AD, Vascular Dementia or Fronto-Temporal Dementia types (Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005). The remaining seven studies were non-specific dementia aetiology (Blankevoort et al, 2013;Fox, Henwood, et al, 2014a;McGough et al, 2013;Nordin et al, 2006;Sterke et al, 2010;V.…”

“…Walk speed was the most common outcome measure assessed within the included studies (Blankevoort et al, 2013;Bramell-Risberg et al, 2005;Fox, Henwood, et al, 2014a;McGough et al, 2013;Ries et al, 2009;Suttanon et al, 2011;Tappen et al, 1997; V. Thomas & Hageman, 2002;Wittwer et al, 2008 Thomas & Hageman, 2002), three trials (Blankevoort et al, 2013;Fox, Henwood, et al, 2014a;Suttanon et al, 2011) and ten trials (Wittwer et al, 2008). All studies using multiple trials took the mean value of trials for analysis.…”