Rambling speech 'could be indicator of dementia later in life', research suggests

Early signs: Rambling speech could be an early indicator of dementia, scientists have warned
PA
Fiona Simpson21 February 2017

Rambling speech could be an indicator of dementia later in life, new research suggests.

Difficultly composing simple sentences could be an early indication of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), a condition which may lead to Alzheimer’s, scientists claimed.

As part of an experiment, 24 healthy older people and 22 MCI sufferers were asked to create a sentence out of three words.

Lead researcher Dr Janet Cohen Sherman, from Massachusetts General Hospital, said: "The MCIs are very long-winded.

"One significant difference is the mean length of utterance, how many words MCI subjects used versus healthy older - it was a very significant difference.

"MCIs almost tended to get lost along the way and had more difficulty connecting the three words and also difficulty remembering the three words."

One example of the test was having to construct a sentence out of the words "stove, water and pot".

A simple solution would be: "I filled the pot with water and put it on the stove."

"The healthy older individuals could give us a very concise sentence with the three words, and so could the healthy young, but individuals with mild cognitive impairment struggled," said Dr Sherman.

She stressed that it was the way a person's speech patterns changed over time that was important.

Someone who had always rambled would not be considered at risk in the same way as a person who turned into a rambler, Dr Sherman added.

Previous studies compared the speech of former US presidents Ronald Reagan and George HW Bush.

Dr Sherman said: "Ronald Reagan started to have a decline in the number of unique words with repetitions of statements over time, whereas George HW Bush didn't.

"Ronald Reagan started using more fillers, more empty phrases, like 'thing' or 'something' or things like 'basically' or 'actually' or 'well'."

In 1994, six years after he left office, Reagan publicly announced that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's.

Dr Sherman hopes to develop a test which indicates the early stages of the disease within the next five years.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in