Interaction between cognitive status, fear of falling, and balance in elderly persons

Evaluate the cognitive function and its relationship with balance, history of falls, and fear of falling in the elderly.

We evaluated 250 elderly persons aged at least 60 years, who answered a sociodemographic questionnaire about the occurrence of falls in the last year. The cognitive function, balance, and fear of falling were assessed using the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), Berg Balance Scale (BBS), and Falls Efficacy Scale (FES-I) scores, respectively. Participants were allocated into two groups based on the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) score, the Group with Possible Cognitive Decline (GPCD) and the group with no cognitive decline (GNCD). We performed Student's t-test and Pearson's correlation for independent samples.

The Group with Possible Cognitive Decline (GPCD) showed lower balance (p=0.003) and greater fear of falling (p=0.008) (BBS=50.98±4.68; FES-I=26.06±8.78) compared to the GNCD (BBS=52.53±3.047; FES-I=23.21±7.74).

Elderly persons with cognitive decline have lower balance, greater fear of falling, and greater recurrence of falls.