Assessment of time-related deficits in older adults: a scoping review protocol

People with cognitive impairments often have difficulties in managing their time for daily activities. In older adults with cognitive impairments such as dementia and stroke, these may present as disorientation, poor time awareness, time perception, daily time management and so on. Time-related deficits and associated behaviours impede independent living and add considerably to caregiver strain. Several interventions are being investigated to help people with cognitive impairments orient and navigate time and do their daily activities. The provision of interventions requires the use of sound assessment tools. However, it is not clear how time-related concepts are specifically evaluated in practice, what are the available assessments and how these assessments should be selected.

This protocol follows the Joanna Briggs Institute Reviewer's Manual (2020) for scoping reviews and is registered with the Open Science Framework (https://osf.io/4ptgy/). We will include the following databases: PubMed, CINAHL, Scopus, Web of Science and PsycINFO. Two reviewers will independently screen eligible studies for inclusion against the selection criteria and then review the full-text of the selected studies. We will extract the bibliographic data, study design and setting, and details of assessments used in the studies to evaluate time-related concepts including format, mode and duration of administration, psychometric properties and so on. The identified assessments will be mapped with regard to time-related concepts being evaluated and described using narrative synthesis.

As secondary data analysis, ethics approval is not required for this scoping review. We plan to disseminate the results through peer-reviewed journals and conferences targeting health professionals working with older adults.