|
 For the study, researchers examined data from more than a decade of
regular surveys of cognitive abilities and pain levels among 10,065
elderly adults. Participants who reported often suffering from
moderate to severe pain in both of the first two surveys experienced
a 9.2 percent faster decline in memory over the next 10 years than
people who didn’t.
After a decade, this accelerated memory decline was associated with
16 percent higher odds that people would be unable to keep track of
their medications and 12 percent greater likelihood that they would
struggle to manage their finances, the study found. It was also
linked to about 8 percent greater odds of dementia compared to the
seniors without persistent pain.
“People with chronic pain tend to perform poorly on cognitive tests,
particularly of memory and attention, compared with people who don’t
have chronic pain, but we did not know whether that is due to faster
cognitive decline or worse cognitive performance overall,” said lead
study author Dr. Elizabeth Whitlock of the University of California,
San Francisco.
“The current study showed that, at a population level, it is likely
that people with pain have a faster rate of cognitive decline over
time than people without pain,” Whitlock said by email.
All of the people in the study were living independently in the
community, and not in nursing homes or other institutional settings.
Half of them were at least 73 years old, and 60 percent were women.
To be included in the analysis, they had to complete surveys in both
1998 and 2000, and they were classified as having persistent pain if
they reported moderate to severe pain in both of those surveys.
Based on results from those first two surveys, about 11 percent of
the participants had persistent pain at the start of the study. This
was associated with worse symptoms of depression and more
limitations in activities of daily living, researchers report in
JAMA Internal Medicine.
With persistent pain, people also had a 2.2 percent higher absolute
risk of dementia by the end of the study.
The study wasn’t a controlled experiment designed to prove that
higher levels of pain directly contribute to a lower levels of
cognitive ability over time.
[to top of second column] |
Another limitation is that people with persistent pain were more
likely to drop out or die during the study period, leaving more
survey data on pain-free people by the end of the study, the authors
note. Researchers also lacked data on other factors that can
influence pain levels and cognitive abilities such as medication use
or social interactions.
The magnitude of the effect pain had on dementia in the study was
also small, and it’s hard to translate these results into specific
health decisions individual patients might face, said Dr. Jeffrey M.
Burns, co-director of the University of Kansas Alzheimer’s Disease
Center in Kansas City.
“It is impossible to know causally what is truly driving the decline
in memory given the complexity of causes of memory loss in a
population of people with chronic pain,” Burns, who wasn’t involved
in the study, said by email.
“Nevertheless, if you have chronic pain, treat it and its root cause
to minimize its impact on health and quality of mind,” Burns added.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/2sdBxxh JAMA Internal Medicine, online June 5,
2017.
[© 2017 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2017 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
