Department of Occupational Therapy, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Kagoshima University, Kagoshima, Japan.
Visiting Researcher, Faculty of Medicine, Kagoshima University, Kagoshima, Japan.
Psychogeriatrics. 2023 Jan;23(1):3-10. doi: 10.1111/psyg.12893. Epub 2022 Oct 9.
Older adults with subjective memory complaints (SMC) may experience very minor difficulties in daily activities. Although caregivers and occupational therapists who support community-dwelling older adults are aware of the existence of characteristic behaviours related to refrigerator management, no specific studies have been conducted. This study aimed to examine the implications of refrigerator management for older adults with SMC.
A self-administered questionnaire was sent to 3000 randomly selected members of Consumer's Co-operative Kagoshima. Of the returned responses, a total of 282 older adults were analyzed. Analyzed subjects were divided into two groups: SMC (+) group (n = 74) and SMC (-) group (n = 192). A questionnaire was created by four occupational therapists and used to assess the characteristics of analyzed subjects and their abilities to manage the refrigerator. The observation list for early signs of dementia was also utilised. A multiple logistic analysis was performed to examine the association between SMC and refrigerator management.
The SMC (+) group had a significantly higher number of refrigerator management errors than the SMC (-) group (P = 0.008). The SMC (+) group had more errors than the SMC (-) group in the following four items regarding refrigerator management; the refrigerator has a lot of the same foods / expired food, the person does not know what's in the refrigerator, the person cannot find what he/she needs in the refrigerator. Moreover, SMC was associated with the item 'the person does not know what is in the refrigerator' (odds ratio 7.44, 95% CI 1.51-43.8, P = 0.02).
Our results showed that older adults with SMC had several problems regarding refrigerator management. Evaluating refrigerator management among older adults with SMC may help consider multifaceted support.
有主观记忆主诉（SMC）的老年人可能在日常活动中遇到非常轻微的困难。尽管支持社区居住的老年人的护理人员和职业治疗师意识到与冰箱管理相关的特征行为的存在，但没有进行具体的研究。本研究旨在检查冰箱管理对有 SMC 的老年人的影响。
向 3000 名随机选择的消费者合作鹿儿岛成员发送了一份自我管理问卷。在返回的回复中，共分析了 282 名老年人。分析对象分为两组：SMC（+）组（n=74）和 SMC（-）组（n=192）。由四位职业治疗师创建了一份问卷，用于评估分析对象的特征及其管理冰箱的能力。还使用了早期痴呆迹象观察清单。进行了多项逻辑回归分析，以检查 SMC 与冰箱管理之间的关联。
SMC（+）组的冰箱管理错误数量明显多于 SMC（-）组（P=0.008）。SMC（+）组在冰箱管理的以下四个项目中比 SMC（-）组有更多的错误：冰箱里有很多相同的食物/过期食物、人不知道冰箱里有什么、人在冰箱里找不到他/她需要的东西。此外，SMC 与“人不知道冰箱里有什么”这一项相关（优势比 7.44，95%置信区间 1.51-43.8，P=0.02）。
我们的结果表明，有 SMC 的老年人在冰箱管理方面存在一些问题。评估有 SMC 的老年人的冰箱管理情况可能有助于考虑多方面的支持。
