Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Poor money management decisions like forgetting to pay a bill or not being able to detect fraud may be an early warning signs of Alzheimer's disease.

The study funded by the National Institute on Aging involved 87 older people with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and 76 older people with no memory problems. Each person participated in a money management test. The test was taken a year apart from each other and included counting coins, understanding and using a checkbook, making grocery purchases, understanding and using a bank statement, detecting fraud situations and preparing bills for mailing.

Twenty-five of the 87 of the people with MCI had developed Alzheimer's type dementia a year later. The scores of those patients dropped nine percent on checkbook management and six percent on overall financial knowledge and skills.

"Our findings show that declining money management skills are detectable in patients with MCI in the year prior to developing Alzheimer's disease," study senior author Daniel Marson, J.D., Ph.D., with the Department of Neurology and Alzheimer's Disease Research Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, was quoted as saying. "Doctors should proactively monitor people with MCI for declining financial skills and advise them and their caregivers about steps they can take to watch for signs of poor money management."

SOURCE: Neurology, September 22, 2009

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