The Tasmanian Healthy Brain Project (THBP): a prospective longitudinal examination of the effect of university-level education in older adults in preventing age-related cognitive decline and reducing the risk of dementia.

Background: Differences in the level of cognitive compromise between individuals following brain injury are thought to arise from underlying differences in cognitive reserve. The level of cognitive reserve attained by an individual is influenced by both genetic and life experience factors such as educational attainment and occupational history. The Tasmanian Healthy Brain Project (THBP) is a world-first prospective study examining the capacity of university-level education to enhance cognitive reserve in older adults and subsequently reduce age-related cognitive decline and risk for neurodegenerative disease.

Neuropsychological measures predict decline to Alzheimer's dementia from mild cognitive impairment.

Objective: Studies of Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) show elevated rates of conversion to dementia at the group level. However, previous studies of the trajectory of MCI identify great heterogeneity of outcomes, with a significant proportion of individuals with MCI remaining stable over time, changing MCI subtype classification, or reverting to a normal cognitive state at long-term follow-up.

Method: The present study examined individual outcomes at 20 months in a group of older adults classified according to MCI subtypes.

Longitudinal deficits to attention, executive, and working memory in subtypes of mild cognitive impairment.

Objective: Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) has emerged as a classification for a prodromal phase of cognitive decline that may precede the emergence of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Recent research suggests that attention, executive, and working memory deficits may appear much earlier in the progression of AD than traditionally conceptualized, and may be more consistently associated with the later development of AD than memory processing deficits. The present study longitudinally tracked attention, executive and working memory functions in subtypes of MCI.

Attention and working memory deficits in mild cognitive impairment.

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) has emerged as a classification for a prodromal phase of cognitive decline preceding the emergence of Alzheimer's disease (AD). We examined neuropsychological functioning in a sample of 60 adults with amnestic-MCI (a-MCI), 32 with subjective complaints of memory impairment (subjective-MCI, s-MCI), 14 with mild AD, and 25 age-matched controls. Both the a-MCI and s-MCI groups displayed impaired attentional processing, working memory capacity, and semantic language, with a-MCI displaying additional impairments to verbal and/or visual memory.