A Novel Non-Pharmaceutical Treatment for Patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) represents a pre-dementia stage. Currently, there is no evidence for long-term efficacy of pharmacological treatment for preventing conversion to clinical dementia. Healthy lifestyle modifications, cognitive training and psychosocial initiatives are strongly recommended. This was an 8-week parallel randomized two-armed study. Eligible patients were randomized to intervention and control group, with the intervention group receiving the PSAI intervention including cognitive training, healthy lifestyle and stress management. Standardized questionnaires were used pre- and post-intervention. The between group analysis revealed a significant improvement in cognitive aspects, depression, stress, anxiety and self-efficacy post-intervention (p r > 0.5). Nine patients in the intervention group had one point increase in the MMSE score and one patient had a two-point increment post-intervention. Future studies should expand these preliminary findings to larger samples, neuroimaging measurements and longer follow-up in order to ascertain PSAI's role in preventing conversion to clinical dementia.