Aging and mild cognitive impairment

Abstract

Normal aging of the nervous system is characterized by slow, most of the time continuous, changes in several cognitive processes. Sometimes of this changes exceed what is expected for normal aging. This is frequently the case with memory changes. The problem, for the clinician, is to know whether these changes reflect normal aging or represent an incipient dementia. A number of clinical labels have been proposed to describe these states of cognitive impairment without dementia. The concept of mild cognitive impairment (MCI, Petersen et al., 1999) has predominated. To determine if the presence of MCI leads to an increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease (AD) in some of the major concerns in this area.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17575/rpsicol.v16i1.469