Key points are not available for this paper at this time.
This cohort study found that delirium was associated with a 40% acceleration in the slope of cognitive decline out to 72 months following elective surgery. Because this is an observational study, we cannot be sure whether delirium directly causes subsequent cognitive decline, or whether patients with preclinical brain disease are more likely to develop delirium. Future research is needed to understand the causal pathway between delirium and cognitive decline.
Kunicki et al. (Mon,) studied this question.