Developing a Dementia Platform Databank Using Multiple Existing Cohorts

• DOI: 10.3349/ymj.2021.62.11.1062
• Publication Date: 2021-10-20T03:32:17Z
• Authors: Minwoong Kang; Bo Kyoung Cheon; Min Jung Hahn; Sang Won Seo; Juhee Cho; Soo-Yong Shin; Duk L. Na; Jaelim Cho; Seong Hye Choi; Danbee Kang
• Keywords: Cognitive Dysfunction*; Dementia* / diagnosis; 610; Brain; Pilot Projects; cohort; Brief Communication; 3. Good health; 03 medical and health sciences; platform; 0302 clinical medicine; Alzheimer Disease; Alzheimer Disease*; Dementia* / epidemiology; Humans; Cognitive Dysfunction; Dementia; Female; database; Aged

This study was conducted as a pilot project to evaluate the feasibility of building an integrate dementia platform converging preexisting dementia cohorts from several variable levels. The following four cohorts were used to develop this pilot platform: 1) Clinical Research Center for Dementia of South Korea (CREDOS), 2) Korean Brain Aging Study for Early Diagnosis and Prediction of Alzheimer's disease (K-BASE), 3) Environmental Pollution-induced Neurological Effects (EPINEF) study, and 4) a prospective registry in Dementia Platform Korea project (DPKR). A total of 29916 patients were included in the platform with 348 integrated variables. Among participants, 13.9%, 31.5%, and 44.2% of patients had normal cognition, mild cognitive impairment, and dementia, respectively. The mean age was 72.4 years. Females accounted for 65.7% of all patients. Those with college or higher education and those without problems in reading or writing accounted for 12.3% and 46.8%, respectively. Marital status, cohabitation, family history of Parkinson's disease, smoking and drinking status, physical activity, sleep status, and nutrition status had rates of missing information of 50% or more. Although individual cohorts were of the same domain and of high quality, we found there were several barriers to integrating individual cohorts, including variability in study variables and measurements. Although many researchers are trying to combine pre-existing cohorts, the process of integrating past data has not been easy. Therefore, it is necessary to establish a protocol with considerations for data integration at the cohort establishment stage.