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St. Louis, Mo. – The woman lives alone, but she is rarely alone. Friends spend most mornings and a niece goes on a weekly tour. Despite everything, most of his afternoons and evenings spent in his chair watching the clouds and the sky through a bay window. The call sounded good.
"Hello," he said in a cheerful voice, asking him if he could use his first name. She did not remember registering for the competition, but he badured her that she had it and that it mattered little: What matters, he said, was Is that she has won. "And what you have won is a unique investment opportunity," he said. If she sent $ 200, she would get $ 2,000 in return, 10 times the return on investment.
"She transferred $ 200 from her bank to them, and the situation has continued to intensify, and they started calling her every day," said Dr. Angela Sanford, who practices geriatric medicine at the St. Louis University Hospital. "She was probably between $ 10,000 and $ 12,000 before the niece knew it."
The Sanford patient, later diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment, did not achieve a "super low" score on memory tests. She said: The problem in her brain did not affect the patient's ability to remember, but her ability to judge.
Every year, $ 3 billion is stolen or defrauded by millions of seniors, according to the US Department of Justice. Sometimes good judgment is to hang up: Older people who have trouble ending a conversation with fake telemarketers may be at risk for dementia, according to a new study.
In a large group of elderly people with no evidence of dementia, those with little or no awareness of possible telephone fraud have been found to be at greater risk for mild cognitive decline and in some cases of Alzheimer's disease compared to people more aware of the potential. the drawbacks, according to the study, published Monday in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.
Patricia Boyle, lead author of the study and neurologist psychologist at the Rush University Alzheimer's Disease Center, said that this study "adds to our understanding of fraud at home." This suggests that many older, cognitively impaired seniors may be at risk of financial fraud and other forms of fraud and abuse, and is truly shedding new light on the issue of older adults in general. extent of this problem. "
Bad decisions can occur before memory loss
Boyle and his colleagues hypothesize that easily scammed older people are not necessarily those who are obviously forgetful or confused.
To test this theory, researchers recruited 935 elderly people in the Chicago area who had not been diagnosed with dementia.
To start, participants completed a "scam awareness questionnaire" consisting of five statements: "I answer the phone when it rings, even if I do not know who's calling." "I'm struggling to end a phone call, even if the caller is a telemarketer, someone I do not know or someone I did not want to call." to me." "If something seems too good to be true, it's usually the case." "People over 65 [years old] are often targeted by crooks. "" When telemarketers call me, I usually listen to what they have to say. "
Each year, participants also completed traditional neuropsychological tests during the study (approximately six years on average). The 264 participants who died during the study period underwent an autopsy of the brain, a post mortem examination of the brain for signs of illness.
During the study, 151 participants (or 16.1%) developed Alzheimer's and 255 (or 34.2%) developed mild cognitive impairment.
The researchers found that participants with little awareness of the scam at the start of the study had a higher risk of Alzheimer's disease, dementia, or mild cognitive impairment. The low scores on the fraud awareness test were also badociated with symptoms of Alzheimer's disease in the post mortem brain, particularly beta-amyloid plaque, as evidenced by autopsies.
"Social cognition – social judgment – involves a wide range of functions," said Boyle. This "complicated behavior involves and incorporates many different abilities, including cognition, including the regulation of emotions, including making inferences and the perception of others' behavior, as well as regulating one's own impulses." The ability to discern whether a person is trustworthy is an example of social cognition.
"Because it's a complex behavior, it probably involves distributed brain networks to support it," Boyle said. A growing body of work shows that poor financial decisions or deficiencies in complex everyday tasks – aspects of social cognition – can occur before the onset of obvious cognitive symptoms such as memory loss, has she said.
Early detection can prevent scams
Neither Sanford nor his patient participated in the new study, but she said the research was "interesting" and could be used to advocate for further screening for mild cognitive impairment in people elderly.
"We do not do enough screening in this country, and we have no directive that says [physicians] to do it, "she said. Many of these patients are undiagnosed and bad things, such as scams, occur before we become aware of them. "
With many doctors, a test is not administered until no one has come to talk about memory problems, she said. "In geriatrics, we advocate for universal screening," she said.
"We find that dementia and cognitive impairment are much more prevalent in the general population than most people know," she said. Based on her own study of adults over 65 in St. Louis and a rural clinic, she found that "28% of the 10,288 people we examined met the criteria for dementia. Age and was a higher percentage in urban areas. "She theorizes that the highest rates in urban areas are based on a low level of education and socioeconomic levels in inner cities.
"It is often harder to contract a mild cognitive impairment than dementia because it is often much more subtle," she said, noting that many people with cognitive impairment can function optimally at home. It is helpful to understand that a patient with mild cognitive impairment is helpful "because your approach to a patient changes when you know that there is memory impairment and that you can start having these conversations with the family earlier and plan for the future, "she said.
Several Sanford patients have been victims of financial scams, she said. "That's what tells the family that something is going on here, and I think backwards: it could have been avoided. "
Help for families
With the woman who thought she had won a draw, the police got involved and discovered that a person abroad was making phone calls. "The niece had to change her phone number three times, she had to find her number and she even contacted her on Facebook," said Sanford.
The woman got a high score on memory tests, but the pathological changes in her brain affected her judgment, said Sanford.
Boyle said, "The advice for families is to stay alert to the problem of elder fraud." She recommends the websites of the Financial Regulatory Authority and AARP, which offer helpful tips for seniors and their families. AARP, for example, describes scams in which people portray themselves as agents of the IRS.
"Beware of fraudsters and their tactics – find out the most likely scams right now," Boyle said.
Sanford said that early detection of cognitive impairment can lead to early awareness of a problem and can be helpful for doctors and families.
"Banks will send SMS to families when the debit card is used, and they can set limits," she said. "So there are different ways to protect against some of these scams, and these kinds of things can be put in place earlier, before the crisis happens."
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