Frontal functions and activities of daily living in Alzheimer's disease.

Our study explores activities of daily living and frontal functions in mild Alzheimer's disease. According to Stuss there is four frontal functions: executive functions, energization, make decision, and metacognition. The aim of our study is to determine how much frontal functions impact the daily living. For this purpose, the study was proposed to 25 patients with mild Alzheimer's disease and 17 control subjects, matched by age and sociocultural level. All subjects had benefited from an evaluation of global efficiency, autonomy, and frontal functions. Our results showed significant correlations between the degree of dependence and the difficulty of sustaining energization and make decision. In the context of an aging population, a better understanding of the mechanisms leading to a loss of autonomy is a major objective, especially to implement effective prevention.