Author(s)

Abdeljalil Talhaoui^*, Youssef Aboussaleh, Ahmed Ahami, Rachid Sbaibi, Naima Agoutim

Behavioral Neuroscience & Nutritional Health Team, Laboratory of Nutrition & Health, Department of Biology, Faculty of Sciences, Ibn Tofail University, Kenitra, Morocco.

Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the association between the malnutrition and risk of cognitive impairment among Morocco older adults. Materials and methods: A sample of 237 older adults aged above 60 years were recruited from three nursing homes belonging to three different cities, Rabat, Kenitra and Sidi Kacem City and from one health center in Sidi Kacem City. From them, 172 subjects (56.4% men) were included in our study for their completion. Cognitive functions were assessed by the Mini-Mental State Examination. Nutritional status, depression and physical activity were assessed using respectively: MNA, GDS-15 and GPAQ. The binary logistic regression was performed where the cognitive function was taking as the dependent variable and all other outcomes as independent variables. Results: Our results showed that 69.8% of total simple were classed as having cognitive impairment while only 30.2% were normal. The binary logistic regression assessed showed that the malnutrition (OR = 3.03, 95% CI: 1.34 - 6.85), gender (OR = 2.22, 95% CI: 1.03 - 5.71) and low education (OR = 8.35, 95% CI: 1.32 - 52.83) were risk factors for cognitive impairment, when moderate level of physical activity (OR = 0.19, 95% CI: 0.06 - 0.54) was a protective factor compared to the limited level. Conclusions: Our study supported past literature that malnutrition and low level of physical activity were risk factors of cognitive impairment. These indicate that nutritional status monitoring and the practice of regular physical activities can prevent it from leading to Alzheimer’s disease.

Cognitive Impairment, Cognitive Function, Malnutrition, Older Adults

Talhaoui, A. , Aboussaleh, Y. , Ahami, A. , Sbaibi, R. and Agoutim, N. (2019) Association between Malnutrition and Cognitive Impairment among Morocco’s Older Adults. Open Journal of Medical Psychology, 8, 1-14. doi: 10.4236/ojmp.2019.81001.