Change in Executive Function and IADL Using a Virtual Supermarket Environment Among People With MCI (EF-VAPS)

Israel Healthcare Foundation

Status and phase: Unknown; Phase 1

Conditions: Mild Cognitive Impairment; Lack of Physical Activity

Treatments: Behavioral: Virtual Action Planning Supermarket (VAP-S) Software

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT01103453

CMC090105CTIL

Details and patient eligibility

About

The aim of the study is to investigate the feasibility of using a virtual supermarket as an intervention tool for overcoming deficits in executive function as well as enhancing IADL performance among persons with Mild Cognitive Impairment. The working hypotheses are that there will be improvement in executive functions, and the improvement in the executive functions will result in better performance in Instrumental Activities of Daily Living, both generally and especially in shopping task

Full description

Scientific and clinical research in the area of Alzheimer's disease (AD) during the last years have shifted their focus to earlier diagnosis and especially to the transitional phase between normal aging and dementia, named Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI).Lately, the concept of MCI has been expanded to address observed clinical heterogeneity, and subtypes were recognized: amnestic (including memory impairment) and non-amnestic (including impairment in other non-memory cognitive domains), with the later including deficits in executive functioning Executive functions (EF) are defined as higher order functions that are needed for completing complex or non-routine tasks. Deficits in EF refer to a collection of deficits in attention, planning, problem-solving, multitasking, monitoring and behavioral control and persons who suffer from impairments in EF typically have difficulty in initiating or suspending activities, show impaired mental flexibility, as well as increased distractibility and have difficulty in learning novel tasks despite apparently intact cognitive abilities.

Lately, an increasing amount of studies suggest that persons with MCI might have deficits in EF, moreover, persons presenting a combination of executive deficits and memory deficits were found to be a high risk group for conversion to AD.

Enrollment: 10 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 60 to 90 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Age 60+
• Diagnosed as suffering from MCI
• No impaired judgement
• Verbal and written proficiency in Hebrew
• Normal or corrected-to-normal vision and hearing ability
• Independent in ADL function
• Lives in the community
• Able to perform task of shopping.

Exclusion criteria

• Suffering from other coexistent neurological diseases (e.g. stroke, muscular dystrophy)
• Has acute arthritis
• Poorly controlled hypothyroidism
• Suffering from physical or sensory limitations, as by self-report or noted by the investigator, that may limit the use of a computer's mouse
• No skills in performing shopping task
• Defined as suffering from depression as determined by the rating scale for depression
• Diagnosed as suffering from dementia as defined by Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders criteria (DSM-IV)

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Non-Randomized

Interventional model: Single Group Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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10 participants in 1 patient group

Intervention Group

Experimental group

Description:

Study group are persons diagnosed as suffering from Mild Cognitive Impairment will undergo a series of 9 sessions on a computer program of a virtual supermarket to improve their Executive and IADL functions.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Virtual Action Planning Supermarket (VAP-S) Software