IZVRŠNO FUNKCIONISANJE OBOLJELIH OD PARKINSONOVE BOLESTI
EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONING OF PATIENTS WITH PARKINSON’S DISEASE

Summary/Abstract: In this paper, a systematic review of the published scientific literature is provided, and the connection between pathological changes at the level of executive functioning of patients with Parkinson’s disease is discussed. Executive functioning is often the subject of research in people with Parkinson’s disease (PD), from the earliest to advanced stages of the disease. Much of the contemporary empirical literature indicates the presence of executive deficits in PD patients. The study aimed at answering three questions: how is executive functioning measured in PD patients, does executive dysfunction occur consistently in all PD patients, and at what stage does the disease manifest itself, and the type of link between executive dysfunction and the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. A total of 40 scientific studies were analysed, including 2 meta-analytic studies and 35 correlative and experimental studies with a sample of PD patients and a healthy, control group, and three studies with pre-diagnosed samples of subjects. The studies examined global executive functioning, but also individual executive functions in patients with PD, compared to the healthy population. The findings of the study indicate that researchers approach the operationalization of executive function constructs and their measurement in different ways, which makes it difficult to draw general conclusions about the researched phenomenon. The results of this review suggest that executive dysfunction in PD patients occurs from I to V stages of the disease, according to the criteria of the Hoehn-Yahr scale for the assessment of Parkinson’s disease. Executive deficits in patients worsen during the development of the primary diagnosis, that is, with the worsening of motor and non-motor symptoms of PD.

• Details
• Contents