Clinical characteristics of individuals with subjective memory loss in Western Australia: Results from a cross-sectional survey

Background. Subjective memory complaint is common in later life. Its relationship to future risk of dementia is unclear, although many reports have found a positive association. We designed the present cross-sectional survey to investigate the clinical features associated with subjective memory impairment.Method. One hundred and eight volunteers and 38 non-complainers acting as age-matched controls were recruited. Eleven subjects with memory complaints were excluded because of prior stroke or low Mh ISE score. The CAMCOG was used to measure cognition; complainers had significantly lower scores (p4 allele was similar for both groups (p=0.469). Logistic regression analysis indicated that CAMCOG scores (p=0.002) and word-finding difficulty (p=0.002) were independently associated with memory complaints.Conclusions. These results show that memory complainers have worse cognitive performance than non-complainers and support the findings of other studies that suggest that subjective memory loss may be a reliable indicator of cognitive decline. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.