Brucki Sonia Maria Dozzi
MD, Behavioral and Cognitive Neurology Unit, Department of Neurology, University of São Paulo School of Medicine and Hospital Santa Marcelina, São Paulo SP, Brazil.
Dement Neuropsychol. 2010 Jul-Sep;4(3):153-157. doi: 10.1590/S1980-57642010DN40300002.
There is a current concept that illiteracy and lower educational levels are risk factors for cognitive decline and dementia. Our aims were to review the association between illiteracy and dementia; and to describe some results on neuropsychological findings in illiteracy. A literature search of the PubMed database was performed. The search terms were "dementia", "illiteracy", "neuropsychological evaluation", "educational levels", and "education". Only papers published in Portuguese, English, and Spanish were reviewed. Illiteracy is an incontestable risk factor for dementia. It influences performance on almost cognitive tests. Many other factors could be connected to the high prevalence of dementia among illiterates: low cognitive reserve, poor control of cerebrovascular disease risk factors, difficulties in cognitive evaluation, and poor adaptation of neuropsychological tests for this specific population. Functional tests must be coupled with cognitive tests to ameliorate diagnostic accuracy.
目前有一种观点认为，文盲和低教育水平是认知能力下降和痴呆症的风险因素。我们的目的是回顾文盲与痴呆症之间的关联；并描述一些关于文盲人群神经心理学研究结果。我们对PubMed数据库进行了文献检索。检索词为“痴呆症”“文盲”“神经心理学评估”“教育水平”和“教育”。仅对以葡萄牙语、英语和西班牙语发表的论文进行了综述。文盲是痴呆症无可争议的风险因素。它几乎会影响所有认知测试的表现。文盲人群中痴呆症的高患病率可能还与许多其他因素有关：认知储备低、脑血管疾病危险因素控制不佳、认知评估困难以及针对这一特定人群的神经心理学测试适应性差。功能测试必须与认知测试相结合，以提高诊断准确性。
