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En el envejecimiento normal, sin generalizar a toda la población adulta mayor, se puede presentar un declive en las funciones cognitivas e intelectuales previamente desarrolladas por el individuo. Desde la neuropsicología se han movilizado estrategias para mejorar este funcionamiento o detener el declive que se pueda presentar. Dentro de las estrategias de intervención, los programas de estimulación cognitiva muestran efectos beneficiosos en la cognición de estos adultos, mejorando o retardando problemas asociados a una demencia. El objetivo de este estudio fue identificar los perfiles pre y post, de un grupo de adultos mayores a quienes se les suministró un programa de estimulación en las funciones mentales superiores. Esta investigación está enmarcada dentro de un tipo de estudio comparativo-descriptivo, cuasi experimental, de diseño con grupo de estudio y grupo de comparación no equivalentes, realizado a 40 adultos mayores de ambos géneros quienes residen en la Ciudad de Bogotá. Para el análisis estadístico de los resultados se utilizó el paquete estadístico SPSS en su versión 22, utilizando estadísticos descriptivos y la prueba U de Mann-Whitney para las comparaciones. En los resultados se encontraron cambios en el perfil del grupo de estudio a nivel de sus medias, con datos estadísticamente significativos, evidenciando una mejoría tras el proceso de estimulación. Mientras que el grupo comparación mantuvo sus perfiles. En conclusión, se establece la relevancia de la estimulación cognitiva en el envejecimiento normal como proceso terapéutico para el mantenimiento del funcionamiento cognitivo y la mejora de la calidad de vida de la población adulta mayor.
In normal aging, without making a generalization to the entire adult population, there may be a decline in cognitive and intellectual functions previously acquired by the individual, from neuropsychology have mobilized strategies to improve performance or stop the decline can be put forward. Within intervention strategies, cognitive stimulation programs have shown beneficial effects on cognition of these adults as well, they enhance or retard the problems associated with dementia, these facts are based in the light of the concept of brain plasticity, which refers to human beings in terms of central nervous system, have the ability to weigh compensatory manner constraints specific performance of some cognitive functions, with other areas or circuits that are preserved and allow the execution of cognitive activities, likewise this compensatory phenomenon has been worked today under the concept of cognitive reserve, where it is stated that the various activities throughout life, and specifically cognitively stimulating activities in adulthood, allows the delay process in most neurodegenerative adulthood.
For this study, our objective was to identify the pre and post of a group of older adults who received cognitive stimulation program of higher mental functions profiles. This research is part of a type of comparative descriptive design, quasi-experimental with a study group and a comparison group not equivalent, the study population consisted of 40 elderly residents of both genders, institutionalized in a geriatric center in the city of Bogotá. For statistical analysis of the results the SPSS statistical package was used in version 22 for the pre-post evaluation with which the initial cognitive functioning of both group (baseline) was established and the subsequent performance of the implementation described stimulation program in the study group, descriptive statistical tests were used measures of central tendency and variability. Given the level of measurement variables to make comparisons performed before and after cognitive stimulation program to establish statistical inferences parametric statistics were used by Mann-Whitney U test, with a significance level of 0,05. As for the results of changes in neuropsychological profiles in their half of the study group concerned, where statistically significant differences were observed, showing an improvement after stimulation process is highlighted. In these results, the best performance is highlighted in the attentional tests strikethrough frame, the subtest of the WAIS-III Digitsymbol, in memory a significant increase in the percentage of information learned through trials curve is observed learning, indicating that stimulation promotes registration processes, storage and retrieval of verbal information and tasks of executive function including verbal abstraction, measured by tests of verbal semantic and phonological fluency is observed also a significant increase in the production of this verbal information, which we infer that this stimulation program in this particular population, allowing an improvement in the management, organization and understanding of verbal material, second test execution digit in reverse order, which assesses working memory, showed no differences that suggest a statistically significant change, but this performance was stable after the implementation of the program of stimulation. While in the comparison group, there were no significant changes in the two assessments over time, just as both neuropsychological profiles in the comparison group were stable in their stockings. In conclusion, the importance of cognitive stimulation in normal aging is established as a therapeutic process to improve one hand cognitive processes, this study particularly best performance was observed in tasks requiring the use or monitoring of verbal language and other side maintain cognitive functioning, which you can see evidenced in improving the quality of life and mood in older adults with normal aging.
