Oregon Study Seeks to Find Financial Behaviors That Could Predict Dementia in Seniors

Researchers at the Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) School of Medicine hope a two-year study will help identify signs of nascent dementia in seniors from their financial behavior, reports Alzheimer's News Today . "We're looking at the connection between very early cognitive decline — not diagnosed and not even detected — and financial behavior over the course of a year," said OSHU's Kathy Wild. Fraud detection company EverSafe will supply software to the study's 140 participants, their families, and the OSHU team for a year. The software flags anomalies in financial behavior in real time, and submits weekly reports on each participant's alerts to the researchers. If the alerts suggest a participant is about to become a victim of fraud or is engaging in other troubling financial behavior, Wild's team informs the participant and their family. Participants take cognitive tests at the start and conclusion of the study so the researchers can identify any deterioration in memory, judgment, reasoning, or the ability to think about multiple topics simultaneously. The team hopes analysis of EverSafe's participant data will enable them to categorize six markers that could indicate early cognitive decline.