Environmental interventions to support orientation and social engagement of people with Alzheimer’s disease

The built environment can be a home to compensatory strategies aimed at increasing the independence of elderly people with Alzheimer’s disease, by mitigating the cognitive impairment caused by it. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to find out which interventions were performed in indoor environments and observe their impacts on the relief of behavioral symptoms related to the disorientation of elderly people with probable Alzheimer’s disease. METHODS: A systematic review was carried out using the preferred reporting items for systematic review and meta-analyses criteria in the MEDLINE/PubMed database. Two researchers carried out the selection of the studies, following the same methodology. The third author contributed during the writing process and in the decision-making. RESULTS: Of note, 375 studies were identified and 20 studies were included in this systematic review. The identified interventions were classified into environmental communications and environmental characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: Environmental communications had positive results in guiding and reducing agitation. In contrast, while reducing behavioral symptoms related to orientation, environmental characteristics showed improvements mainly in social engagement and functional capacity.