Better memory with literacy acquisition later in life: a randomized controlled trial

晚年读写能力提高记忆力：一项随机对照试验

• 批准号: 10263225
• 负责人: Lea Tenenholz Grinberg
• 金额: $ 15.48万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-09-15 至 2024-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10263225
• 关键词: Address; Adult; Anisotropy; Brain; Brazil; Collaborations; Communities; Cross-Sectional Studies; Cues; Dementia; Development; Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Education; Educational Intervention; Elderly; Enrollment; Epidemic; Episodic memory; Europe; Face; Feasibility Studies; Fellowship; Future; Geography; Hand; Hippocampus (Brain); Immediate Recalls; Individual; Institution; Knowledge; Latin America; Learning; Level of Evidence; Life; Literacy Programs; Longitudinal Studies; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Measures; Medial; Memory; Neurologic; Participant; Placebos; Policies; Prefrontal Cortex; Public Policy; Randomized Controlled Trials; Reading; Recording of previous events; Research; Research Personnel; Resources; Rest; Risk Factors; Role; Science; Shapes; Structure; Sum; Techniques; Temporal Lobe; Testing; Training; Training and Infrastructure; Work; Writing; arm; base; cognitive reserve; comparison intervention; cost; dementia risk; frontal lobe; group intervention; illiteracy; illiterate; improved; infrastructure development; intervention cost; intervention effect; literacy; literate; low and middle-income countries; memory process; neuroimaging; placebo group; primary outcome; programs; reading ability; resilience

Abstract Dementia is epidemic with a projected cost of $1.2 trillion by 2050. Currently, 2/3 of people with dementia live in low and middle-income countries (LMIC). 30% of dementia cases are preventable by modifying risk factors such as low education. Formal education acquired early in life protects against dementia, but whether acquiring education later in life can decrease dementia risk is less clear. Our previous cross-sectional work conducted in Brazil/UFMG in partnership with the USA/UCSF suggests that even few years of education might improve brain resilience by strengthening the relationship between episodic memory and medial temporal lobe structures, including the hippocampus (HC) and its connections. Whether acquiring education in adulthood could also strengthen those relationships and increase hippocampal efficiency is unknown. We started a pilot one-arm longitudinal study to determine whether a late-life literacy improves episodic memory measured by hippocampal functional and structural connectivity. Despite the historical challenges of enrolling illiterate adults in research, we devised a successful strategy and met the target enrollment and acquired baseline structural and functional MRIs, demonstrating feasibility of our approach. This proposal will build on and expand the collaboration between UFMG and UCSF to implement a two-arm, randomized controlled trial investigating the role of adult education in improving episodic memory and enhancing hippocampal connectivity. This partnership represents a unique opportunity to test this hypothesis given the combined expertise and resources from both centers. If successful in showing a benefit of adult education into memory, brain structure and function, this proposal will be critical for developing strategies to improve brain resilience and subsequently decrease dementia risk using a low-cost intervention. Noteworthy, The proposal will also contribute to build sustainable research capacity in Brazil by transferring the knowledge on advanced longitudinal neuroimaging analysis to UFMG. The learned techniques will be applied in further studies about neurological conditions conducted not only in UFMG but other Brazilian institutions.

摘要