Psychotic symptoms in older people without dementia from a Brazilian community-based sample: A seven years’ follow-up

BACKGROUND: Studies of the incidence of psychotic symptoms in elderly people at risk of dementia are scarce. This is a seven year follow up study aiming to determine the incidence of psychotic symptoms and their correlation with other clinical aspects, in particular the rate of development of cognitive impairment. METHODS: Cohort study of a community-based sample of elderly subjects. At study entry in 2004, the sample was composed of 1,125 individuals aged 60 years and older. Of this total, 547 subjects were re-evaluated in 2011 and submitted to the original study protocol. Of these, 199 showed no psychotic symptoms at phase I, while 64 already had psychotic symptoms in 2004. RESULTS: The incidence of at least one psychotic symptom in the 7 year period was 8.0% (Visual/tactile hallucinations: 4.5%; Persecutory delusions: 3.0%; Auditory hallucinations: 2.5%). Development of psychotic symptoms was associated with epilepsy (OR: 7.75 and 15.83), lower MMSE (OR: 0.72) and reported depression (OR: 6.48). A total of 57.8% of individuals with psychotic symptoms developed cognitive impairment after 7 years. Visual/tactile hallucinations were the only psychotic symptom predictive of this impairment, which was related to lower MMSE and greater functional impairment. CONCLUSIONS: The incidence of psychotic symptoms and the conversion rate to cognitive impairment was in the upper range when compared with previous reports. Visual/tactile hallucinations were the most frequent symptoms and were predictive of cognitive impairment over the 7 year period. A significant relationship was found between the incidence of psychotic symptoms and low MMSE scores, as well as clinical comorbities such as epilepsy, reported depression, diabetes and syphilis.