Is the presence of episodes of delirium in the elderly a risk factor for the subsequent appearance of a demential syndrome?

© 2018 Spanish Publishers Associate. All Rights Reserved. Aims: The increase of elderly people during the last years, and consequently of the people with severe cognitive impairment, makes necessary to seek preventive and actuation solutions of the disease to control the symptoms. The aim of the present meta-analysis is to study the relation between the occurrence of delirium in the elderly and the further development of dementia. Methodology: Studies were identified through Psychinfo, PubMed and Psicodoc databases. The search combined words like cognitive impairment, delirium and dementia with other terms like risk factors among others. Data were extracted and checked, systematically reviewed and meta-analyzed appropriately. Results: Eight studies were included, with a variety of patients from hip surgery, femoral fracture, general population, stroke and ICU patients. All the studies analyzed concluded that having one or more episodes of delirium is an important risk factor for the subsequent development of dementia. Conclusions: This finding may be for an important help in the future in order to establish secondary prevention programs for dementia in the elderly, to increase quality of life of this people and to reduce the costs that those patients cause in the healthcare system.