Preliminary Findings
The support of our consortium by the National Center for Research Resources - under the auspices of the NIH Roadmap Initiatives - has enabled CREST to conceive, plan, undertake, and execute the first systematic study of elder self-neglect ever completed by an interdisciplinary team. Through this grant, CREST:
- has continued to cultivate old associations, while establishing many new professional and institutional ties (i.e. 35 disciplines and 10 institutions are represented to date;
- has developed an outstanding interdisciplinary team of national experts who are united by their interest in describing and categorizing a phenomenon identified through clinical practice; and
- has implemented pilot studies to gather data in a variety of relevant areas
The results from CREST Phase I have shown that:
- there are multiple clinical phenotypes for self-neglect;
- 25% of self-neglect cases cannot be explained by dementia or depression;
- executive dyscontrol, lack of capacity, and lack of awareness characterize self-neglectors; and
- distinct nutritional abnormalities are correlated with self-neglectors
Members of the CREST research team were the first to identify the health aspects of self-neglect, the first to undertake biomedical research in this area, and the first to arrive at the findings outlined above.