Clinical trial NCT06493422: Online Interplay Between Deciding and Acting with Mild Cognitive Impairment
Official title: Online Interplay Between Deciding and Acting with Mild Cognitive Impairment
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: RECRUITING
Phase: NA
Conditions: Mild Cognitive Impairment
Keywords: Reaching
Brain
Decisions
Lead sponsor: University of Delaware
Sponsor class: OTHER
Collaborators: name: National Institutes of Health (NIH)
name: National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS)
First posted: 2024-07-10
Enrollment: 60
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 45
Maximum age (years): 90
Standard ages: ADULT
OLDER_ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: yes
Allocation: RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: SINGLE_GROUP
Primary purpose: BASIC_SCIENCE

Brief summary: The investigators aim to understand the interplay and neural structures involved with decision--making and movement for participants with mild cognitive impairment. Rapidly deciding and acting becomes bottlenecked with mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's, leading to detrimental outcomes such as falling and car crashes. The investigators work will have a tangible impact by discovering sensitive biomarkers to detect disease onset and pave the way for informed and effective neurorehabilitation.

Detailed description: Mild cognitive impairment leads not only to impaired decision making, but also movement deficits that predict the development of Alzheimer's disease. Recent behavioral work has suggested a common mechanism that throttles the speed of both decisions and reaching movements, which is supported by converging neural evidence that finds an interac-tion between decision making and movement (motor) circuits. Yet it remains unknown how the interplay between decision making and motor neural circuits becomes impaired and impedes rapid responses for those with mild cognitive impairment. Here the investigators test the central hypothesis that there is an impaired interaction between decision making and motor neural circuits with mild cognitive impairment.

First, the investigators will use human reaching experiments to establish that mild cognitive impairment disrupts the interplay of decision making and motor control. Second, the investigators will use Magnetic resonance elastography to elucidate whether brain stiffness in decision making and motor brain regions are related to altered movement behavior. The expected outcome is a mechanistic understanding of how impaired decision making and motor neural circuits impact movement for those with mild cognitive impairment.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

1. age 45 - 90 years
2. Perfect or corrected vision
3. Ability to reach
4. Neurotypical Age-Matched control participants - No history of neurological disorders or injury.
5. Mild Cognitive Impairment participants - clinical diagnosis of amnestic mild cognitive impairment.

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Any injury or condition that impacts reaching
2. Traumatic brain injury, such as concussion, in the last 6 months.
3. Neurotypical Age-Matched control participants: Modified Telephone Interview for Cognitive Status (TICS-m) score \< 34
4. Mild Cognitive Impairment participants: Modified Telephone Interview for Cognitive Status (TICS-m) score \> 34
5. Mild Cognitive Impairment participants: Mini-Mental State Examination Second Edition (MMSE-2) score \< 21.

Primary outcomes:
measure: Reaching Movements
timeFrame: through study completion, an average of 1 year
measure: Change in brain mechanical properties
timeFrame: through study completion, an average of 1 year
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Decision Time
timeFrame: through study completion, an average of 1 year
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Newark
country: United States
facility: University of Delaware
state: Delaware
Study officials:
affiliation: University of Delaware
name: Josh Cashaback
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References: