Yu Kume

• Doctor of Health Sciences
• Professor at Akita University

Developing Age-Friendly Cities and Communities (AFCCs) is an increasingly popular policy response to supporting ageing populations. AFCC programmes rely on cross-sectoral collaboration, involving partnerships among diverse stakeholders working across sectors to address shared goals. However, there remains a limited understanding of what mechanisms...

Our study, conducted between April 2022 and January 2024, was aimed at clarifying components of the rest-activity rhythm (RAR) involved in improvement of social frailty state before or after a 3-month multi-component exercise intervention in the elderly. Participants were recruited from the general population in Akita prefecture, Japan. We administ...

Background: Frailty leads to vulnerability to stress, impaired daily functioning, and an increased need for care. Frailty is considered reversible, and it is crucial to detect the risk of frailty early and investigate factors that may delay its progression. Objectives: To identify tests that can explain frailty risk and compare the situation of loc...

Background: In recent years, theatrical approach has been reported to improve the health promotion of the older adults. Our study aimed to clarify the effects of a theater program intervention on the cognitive, physical, and social functions of older adults living in the community. Methods: Of the 43 participants, they were assigned to the control...

Background: Effects of a multicomponent exercise programme have an impact on the physical, cognitive, and psychological domains in elderly community-dwellers. However, some individuals aged 65 years or more have not shown positive effects after the intervention as reported in similar research. The objective of this quasi-experimental study was to...

Changes in rest or active states were clinically observed in persons with depression. However, the association between symptoms of depression and 24 h rest-activity rhythm (RAR) components that can be measured using wearable devices was not clarified. This preliminary cross-sectional study aimed to clarify the 24 h RAR components associated with sy...

This study examined discharge planning and challenges for patients following total hip arthroplasty in Japan. A cross-sectional national survey of 500 hospitals was conducted in May 2019. Discharge planning education tended to include content on dislocation prevention, including prevention while using a squat toilet and crouching down to sit on the...

Reversibility of frailty in the elderly has been discussed comprehensively and but association between recovery of frail state and rest-activity rhythm (RAR) patterns remains unclear. The aim of the current study was to examine a predictor of RAR patterns at the baseline against change of frail state after the intervention in the elderly community-...

Background: The aim of this study was to examine the association of the multiple facets of oral, motor, and social functions in community-dwelling older adults, to identify factors that might influence the risk of frailty. Methods: Of the 82 participants included in the study, 39 (5 males and 34 females) were young-old adults, with an average ag...

Although frailty has detrimental physical and psychological effects on elderly people, it is potentially reversible. In this study, we aim to evaluate the effectiveness of a pilot frailty education program implemented through barbershops/salons in Japan. In January 2018, we selected five barbershops/salons in Japan where customers were educated on...

Environmental stimulation is expected to have a positive impact on night sleep, psychological or functional states in dementia. The objective of this pilot study was to examine the effects of environmental stimulation consisting of sounds with high-frequency components, aromas, and light exposure from organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) to create...

The aim of this study was to clarify the association between physical and cognitive functions in older adults who converted from a robust health state to a pre-frailty in a one-year follow-up survey. A total of 82 participants were enrolled and classified by the Fried frailty index. The physical and cognitive functions of the participants were eval...

Background: The purpose of this study was to clarify the effect of Deep Micro Vibrotactile (DMV) stimulation on the cognitive functions in elderly people with mild cognitive impairment or mild dementia. Methods: A total of 35 participants with dementia from three nursing homes, who had completed treatment with DMV stimulation at 15-40 Hz (herein...

The present study is assessed the effects of COVID-19 on the mental and physical function after the declaration of an emergency situation, which included the request that residents refrain from going out, in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19 infection. The investigation was conducted from 2019 to 2020. Our samples consisted of 506 older adult...

Abstract: Background: Recent longitudinal studies have reported proportion of frailty transition in older individuals during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our study aimed at clarifying the impact of social frailty in community-dwelling older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic and at identifying factors that can predict transition to social frailty. Metho...

Objective An increase in older drivers has been widely recognized in Japan; accordingly, screening to prevent traffic accidents is a crucial issue for safe driving. As a preliminary study, we examined the association between on-road driving performance and cognition or physical performance in older individuals. Methods The survey was conducted in 2...

To clarify prevalence of social frailty among older adults living in a rural Japanese community, and factors associated with social frailty status. In total, 322 adults aged ≥65 years living in a Japanese rural community took part in the study from 2018 to 2020. Social frailty was defined as deficiencies of: (i) living alone; (ii) talking with som...

Objective Older adults in Japan are tackling health-related challenges brought by comprehensive geriatric symptoms, such as physical and cognitive problems and social-psychological issues. In this nationwide study, we mainly focused on the Kihon checklist (KCL) as certificated necessity of long-term care for Japanese older adults and investigated w...

The present study aimed to clarify whether a multicomponent exercise program could effectively enhance physical and cognitive performances among community-dwellers in a rural area of northern Japan. Community-dwellers aged 60 years or more participated in an exercise program for 90 min/day, once every 2 weeks for 6 months, according to instructions...

The Short Questionnaire to Assess Health-enhancing Physical Activity (SQUASH) measures physical activity. This is a paper-and-pencil assessment. An electronic version of this scale, namely, the E-SQUASH, was developed to address the limitations of the paper-and-pencil version (e.g., missing data, time-consuming data entry processes, delay in sendin...

Introduction: A prevalence of frailty is gradually increasing with the progress of aging in Japan, and critical challenges regarding early diagnosis and prevention of frailty were necessary in community. Although previous studies have well documented the characteristics of physical disability, there is limited information on frail state difference...

Aging societies are a worldwide concern, as people are living longer than ever before. The success of the “barbershop project” in improving community health in the USA suggests that the aging issue can be tackled using this method even in Asia. Nevertheless, the health promotion awareness of barbers/stylists has barely been reported in Asia. This s...

Background: A gradually increasing prevalence of frailty is recognized in the super-aging society that Japan faces, and early detection and intervention of frailty in community-dwellers are critical issues to prevent frailty. Although previous studies have well documented the characteristics of physical disability, there is limited information on f...

We investigated in a preliminarily study the circadian rest-activity rhythm of elderly Japanese community-dwellers according to sarcopenia status based upon the 2019 updated classification criteria of the Asian Working Group for Sarcopenia. A total of 30 participants were recruited from a single rehabilitation center in northern Japan between July...

Effect of a dual-task exercise to motor and memory function for Japanese older individuals in depopulated rural districts: preliminary intervention research from 2016 to 2019 - Yu Kume, Tomoe Fujita, Sachiko Uemura, Shoko Inomata, Megumi Tsugaruya, Akiko Sato, Yoriko Nakamura, Yuki Itakura, Hidetaka Ota

[Purpose] Recent studies have reported the effectiveness of robotic rehabilitation of paralyzed upper limbs in stroke patients. For example, the Single-Joint Hybrid Assistive Limb has been shown to improve upper limb impairments. However, limited data are available on the effectiveness of robotic rehabilitation of the upper limb with regards to dai...

A gradually increasing prevalence of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is recognized in the super-aging society that Japan faces, and early detection and intervention in community-dwellers with MCI are critical issues to prevent dementia. Although many previous studies have revealed MCI/non-MCI differences in older individuals, information on the pre...

Aims: The objective of this study was to introduce mobile telerehabilitation with tablet computers and to verify its practical effectiveness in improving physical function and health status. Methods: In this study, nine adults aged 76.3 ± 3.3 years old participated in 13 exercise sessions led by a physical therapist each lasting 60 min every 2 week...

ASSOCIATION BETWEEN REST-ACTIVITY PATTERNS AND FRAILTY IN JAPANESE ELDERLY PERSONS

The aim of this study was to examine whether the multicomponent exercise program based on an independent home-training can become effective strategy for Japanese older people in a depopulated rural region. Twenty participants over 65 years old without cognitive impairment exercised for 90-min a day, once per 2 weeks for 6 months, according to educa...

Background: Sleep health-related issues, such as poor subjective sleep quality during the night and nocturnal wakefulness, have been a focus of recent research on frailty. However, current trends regarding the chronotypes of older individuals with frailty have not been well documented, and information on the impact of frailty on circadian rest-acti...

Background: Limited information is available on the relationship between sleep disturbances during nighttime and the behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia in older nursing-home residents. However, a few reports on the association between the circadian rest-activity rhythm and the behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia in old...

Background: The sleep-wake cycle and the rest–activity rhythm are known to change with aging, and such changes have been implicated in higher levels of depression as well as an increased incidence of dementia. However, information supporting seasonal changes in the sleep–wake cycle, the rest–activity rhythm and quality of life in older community-dw...

A deterioration in information-processing performance is commonly recognized in patients with chronic schizophrenia. Although the enhancement of cognitive skills in patients with schizophrenia is important, the types of external stimuli that influence performance have not received much attention. The aim of present study was to clarify the effects...

Background: Sleep disturbances are commonly observed in older nursing home residents, mainly in combination with dementia. However, sleep-associated circadian motor activity patterns have not been thoroughly investigated in Japanese nursing homes. The present study aimed to respectively clarify the effect of community living and the presence of de...

Background: The circadian rhythm in older adults is commonly known to change with a decrease in physical activity. However, the association between circadian rhythm metrics and physical activity remains unclear. The objective of this study was to examine circadian activity patterns in older people with and without dementia and to determine the amo...

Background: Irregular circadian rhythm and cognitive impairment are frequently observed in patients with chronic schizophrenia. However, their effects in different living environments or with aging remain unclear. The aim of this study was to clarify the characteristics of circadian rhythm and cognition function in the patients with chronic schizo...