Sources of Discomfort in Persons with Dementia: Scale and Initial Results

Table 1

Participants’ characteristics.

	M (SD)/%
Background
Age	86.08 (8.62)
Gender (female)	72.1
Ethnicity
Caucasian	74.3
African American	13.4
Asian/Pacific Islander	7.8
Hispanic/Latino	3.4
Other	1.1
Marital status
Widowed	58.4
Married	24.3
Separated/divorced	9.2
Never married	7.5
Education
High school or lower	60.7
College/technical school	23.4
Graduate degree	16.0
Function
Cognitive status (MMSE)	8.79 (6.44)
ADL (MDS, mean of 10 items, scale 0–4)	2.72 (.92)
Vision (MDS) impaired	33.7
Hearing (MDS) difficulties or impairment	27.9
Diagnoses and medication
Diagnosis index (of 11 disease categories)	5.32 (1.38)
Total number of medications	8.30 (2.40)
% administered
Sedatives	11.9
Antipsychotics	53.6
Antidepressants	62.0
Antianxiety medications	33.9
Analgesics	98.3

ADL: Activities of Daily Living from 0 (independent) to 4 (total dependence); MMSE: Mini Mental State Examination, range 0–30; higher scores indicate higher cognitive function.