J Korean Neuropsychiatr Assoc.  1997 Jan;36(1):92-102.

Prevalence of Dementia in the Elderly Residents of a Rural Community in Korea

• Woo JI
• Lee JH
• Yoo KY
• Hong JP
• Kim CY
• Kim YI
• Lee KW

Abstract

The authors investigated the prevalence and risk factors of dementia among 1,674 elderly residents in Yonchon county of Kyonggi-do, a rural area of Korea who were above 65 years of age, in 1993. The primary screening was done with MMSE-K(Korean version of Mini-mental State Examination), and the final diagnoses of dementia for 436 subjects were made by NIHCDS-ADRDA criteria. The prevalence of total dementia was 9.5%, and it increased with advancing age. particularly, it rapidly increased in the elderly above 75 years of age. The prevalence of dementia in female as a whole was higher than in male, but this was not shown in each age group. The prevalences of Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia were 4.5% and 2.5%, respectively, Assessing the degree of dementia with DSM-III-R criteria, the prevalence of moderate and severe dementia was 3.3%. Our result showed the similar finding to the prevalence of dementia in western countries, but was different from those of the previous studies in other Asian' countries, China and Japan.

Keyword

Dementia; prevalence; Alzheimer's disease Vascular dementia

MeSH Terms

Aged*
Alzheimer Disease
China
Dementia*
Dementia, Vascular
Diagnosis
Female
Gyeonggi-do
Humans
Japan
Korea*
Male
Mass Screening
Prevalence*
Risk Factors
Rural Population*