We ai
med to describe lon
gitudinal patterns of care in co
mmunity-dwellin
g European patients with Alzhei
mer disease (AD), and deter
mine patient-, care
giver-, and country-related predictors of transitions across different care levels.
Methods
Two-year follow-up data from ICTUS cohort (1375 patients with AD, 12 countries) were analyzed using multistate Markov models to describe transitions across states of care and identify their predictors.
Results
Of the patients, 61.3% stayed in the same state during follow-up, and only 9.5% experienced ≥2 changes between states. Six-month transition probabilities were 11% for informal to formal care and 13% for formal to informal care (in the community). Older age, male gender, poorer cognitive and behavioral scores, and country of residence were associated with transitioning from informal to formal care, but only country of residence was associated with the reverse transition.
Discussion
Changes between different types of care were rare during follow-up, and country factors in particular influenced these transitions.
