Older people's attitudes toward interactive voice response systems.

Background: Interactive voice response (IVR) systems are computer programs that interact with people to provide a number of services from business to healthcare. The healthcare applications are particularly relevant to older adults because they are important consumers of medical services. However, research has found that older adults can experience significant difficulties with IVR and have more negative attitudes toward the technology.

Administration of neuropsychological tests using interactive voice response technology in the elderly: validation and limitations.

Interactive voice response (IVR) systems are computer programs, which interact with people to provide a number of services from business to health care. We examined the ability of an IVR system to administer and score a verbal fluency task (fruits) and the digit span forward and backward in 158 community dwelling people aged between 65 and 92 years of age (full scale IQ of 68-134). Only six participants could not complete all tasks mostly due to early technical problems in the study.

Predictors of successful communication with interactive voice response systems in older people.

Objectives: Interactive voice response (IVR) systems are computer programs that can interact with people to provide a number of services from business to health care. However, surveys examining people's attitudes toward these systems have consistently found that people in general and older people in particular strongly dislike these systems. We wanted to determine the memory and cognitive abilities that predict successful IVR interactions for older people.

Improving older adults' experience with interactive voice response systems.

Background: Interactive voice response (IVR) systems use computer-based voice recognition and software algorithms to conduct human/computer interactions. In recent years, there has been a proliferation of IVR applications in business and healthcare. The available evidence suggests that older people have negative attitudes towards IVR and experience significant difficulties using these systems.

Glucose regulation is associated with cognitive performance in young nondiabetic adults.

Several studies have documented an increased incidence of dementia among diabetic patients. In addition, impaired glucose regulation in both, younger and older adults, has been shown to be associated with neuropsychological deficits, particularly of episodic memory. The main purpose of this study was to examine this association in a large sample of young nondiabetic adults.

Effect of age and glucoregulation on cognitive performance.

Type 2 diabetes has been associated with a number of physiological consequences including neuropathy, retinopathy, and incidence of vascular disease. Less is known about the effect on cognition of prediabetes, a period when glucose regulation is abnormal. It is not clear which aspect of impaired glucoregulation is most predictive of cognitive deterioration.

In-home toxic chemical exposures and children with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Despite the focus on preventing toxic chemical exposures during pregnancy, the perinatal period, and childhood, health professionals have given little attention to the risks and effects of toxic chemical exposures on children with intellectual and developmental disabilities (DD). Children with DD may be at higher risk due to behaviors that persist past a developmentally appropriate age, communication skills, motor skills, nutrition issues, and health problems related to DD. This article examines exposure of children to lead, mercury, and environmental tobacco smoke, three toxicants known to affect children's health and development.

Exploratory factor analysis of neuropsychological tests and their relationship to the Brown-Peterson task.

The interference condition of the Brown-Peterson task and the auditory consonant trigrams test was designed to evaluate working memory in that it required a division of attentional processes to complete two cognitive tasks. However, the specific cognitive functions contributing to the performance of this interference task have yet to be determined. The objective of this study was to determine what other tasks are comparable to the Brown-Peterson task and conduct an exploratory factor analysis that included the measures from the Brown-Peterson task and other neuropsychological measures.

The relationship between impaired glucose tolerance, type 2 diabetes, and cognitive function.

The present review integrates findings of published studies that have evaluated the cognitive function of treated and untreated type 2 diabetic patients and provides a detailed overview of the neuropsychological assessments conducted. Cognitive deficits are observed in older people with glucose intolerance or untreated diabetes but these deficits appear to be attenuated by treatments that improve glycemic control. Cognitive decrements in treated type 2 diabetic patients are most consistently observed on measures of verbal memory (35% of the measures) and processing speed (45% of the measures) while preserved function is observed on measures of visuospatial, attention, semantic and language function.

Explicit and objective scoring criteria for the taylor complex figure test.

The Rey and Taylor figures are two constructional and visual memory tests used interchangeably. The purpose of this study was to develop a scoring system for the Taylor figure based on the explicit guidelines established by Meyers and Meyers (1995) for the Rey figure. Younger (n = 97; mean age = 21 years) and older (n = 61; mean age = 72 years) participants' performance on the Taylor figure was scored according to the proposed scoring system and the original scoring system devised by Taylor (1989).

Addressing the differences in speed of processing of the intervening calculation task on the modified Brown-Peterson task.

The Modified Brown-Peterson task (MBPT) is a task of divided attention and working memory that requires central executive functioning. It is a variant of the Brown-Peterson technique and is useful for studying short-term retention of information. It involves the recall of auditory information under conditions of interference (i.

The relationships between atherosclerosis, heart disease, type 2 diabetes and dementia.

Type 2 diabetes in the elderly is associated with increased incidence of vascular disease, particularly, atherosclerosis of large blood vessels. Together with other risk factors such as dyslipidemia, atherosclerosis increases the risk for coronary heart disease and stroke. Most studies that have examined the impact of type 2 diabetes and other heart disease risk factors on cognitive functions do not provide evidence that heart disease risk factors (with the possible exception of triglycerides) further increase the likelihood of observing cognitive deficits in diabetic patients.

Comparing the Rey and Taylor complex figures: a test-retest study in young and older adults.

The Rey and Taylor figures, two visual perception and memory tests, are not equivalent in terms of their difficulty. The purpose of this study was to examine factors such as age, gender, order of administration, copy time, and copy score that could account for the variability in recall performance. Copy score was shown to be the best overall predictor of recall.

Effect of age and glucoregulation on cognitive performance.

Non-insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) has been associated with a number of physiological consequences including neuropathy, retinopathy and incidence of vascular disease. Recently, several authors reviewed studies that suggested that NIDDM is associated with cognitive impairments leading to a higher incidence of dementia. In the present experiment, we measured cognitive function in 57 healthy male and female non-diabetic older participants who ranged in age from 55 to 84.

Impact of peripheral glucoregulation on memory.

Impaired glucoregulation is associated with neuropsychological deficits, particularly for tests that measure verbal declarative memory performance in older diabetic patients. The performances of 74 undergraduate students (mean age = 21 years) on several verbal declarative measures, including immediate and delayed paragraph recall, verbal free recall, and order reconstruction tasks, were correlated with glucoregulatory indices. The indices were obtained from glucose and insulin levels after a 75-g glucose load.