OBJECTIVES Evaluating functional level of persons with diagnosed or suspected dementia is an important part of occupational therapy. The importance of the environment is often highlighted. We investigated the ability of clients with suspected dementia to perform instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs) in the clinic versus in their homes. METHOD We used the Assessment of Motor and Proc...

We explored whether gender moderated the influence of other factors on solo spousal caregiving. The subsample (N = 452) from the AHEAD study included elderly care recipients (CRs) receiving IADL assistance and their spouses. Logistic regression modeled the likelihood of solo spousal IADL care. Gender moderation was tested by product terms between CRs' gender and measures of partners' health, po...

OBJECTIVES Executive functions supervise the contents of working memory, where information from long-term memory is integrated with information in the immediate present. This study examined whether executive attentional abilities were uniquely associated with the performance of complex, instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs) in cognitively intact and physically high-functioning older w...

This article presents descriptive statistics from the 1982 Long-Term Care Survey on noninstitutionalized elderly Americans with limitations in activities of daily living (ADL) and instrumental activities of daily living (IADL). The focus of this article is on private expenses for home-based care related to ADL and IADL limitations. We describe the amounts of out-of-pocket payments expended rela...

A systematic review of the literature related to performance difficulties for children and adolescents with difficulty processing and integrating sensory information was completed as part of the Evidence-Based Literature Review Project of the American Occupational Therapy Association. The review focused on functional performance difficulties that these children may exhibit in areas of occupatio...

Little is known about the extent to which advanced activities of daily living among patients with dementia are preserved and how family caregivers of these patients support them in the community. In this cross-sectional assessment of pairs of patients with dementia and their family caregivers, we evaluated basic, instrumental, and advanced activities of daily living by comparing past and presen...

Little is known about pathways to homelessness among older adults. We identified life course experiences associated with earlier versus later onset of homelessness in older homeless adults and examined current health and functional status by age at first homelessness. We interviewed 350 homeless adults, aged 50 and older, recruited via population-based sampling. Participants reported age at fir...

THE use of formal devices for assessing function is becoming standard in agencies serving the elderly. In the Gerontological Society's recent contract study on functional assessment (Howell, 1968), a large assortment of rating scales, checklists, and other techniques in use in applied settings was easily assembled. The present state of the trade seems to be one in which each investigator or pra...

OBJECTIVE In Alzheimer's disease (AD), rivastigmine has demonstrated statistically significant efficacy versus placebo on cognition and activities of daily living (ADL). The aim of this retrospective analysis was to further evaluate the treatment effects of rivastigmine on individual ADL items. METHODS This exploratory analysis focused on the Alzheimer's Disease Cooperative Study Activities o...