Papers by Erasmia Giogkaraki
Research Square (Research Square), Apr 16, 2024
Aim: Since the declaration of COVID-19 as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on J... more Aim: Since the declaration of COVID-19 as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on January 30, 2020, the disease escalated into a global pandemic forcing governments around the world to impose measures that affected all aspects of life. Among other countries, Greece adopted social restriction, lockdowns, and quarantines to reduce transmission from person to person. Subjects and Methods: This cross-sectional study aimed to investigate the impact of those measures on sleep health in a Greek adult sample. An online questionnaire collected data during from 650 participant. Results: 60% of responders scored below the clinical cut-off on the RU-SATED, indicating they experienced poor sleep health. Better sleep health was reported with increased age and years of education. On the other hand, higher trauma-related distress, depression, anxiety and stress symptomatology were related to poorer sleep health. No gender differences were observed, and degree of compliance to pandemic restrictions did not in uence sleep health. Hierarchical regression analysis indicated di culty in securing enough/healthy food, testing positive for COVID-19, experiencing an increase in verbal arguments/con icts at home and an increase in responsibilities were the strongest predictors of poor sleep heath. Conclusions: Results highlight the importance of maintaining good sleep health as a pillar of general physical and mental health.
Journal of Public Health
Aim The COVID-19 outbreak escalated into a global pandemic, pushing many governments around the w... more Aim The COVID-19 outbreak escalated into a global pandemic, pushing many governments around the world to impose measures affecting all aspects of life. Similar to other countries, Greece adopted social restriction, lockdowns, and quarantines to reduce transmission from person-to-person. This cross-sectional study investigated the association between social restriction measures, an mental health and coping strategies employed by a Greek adult sample. Subject and methods An online questionnaire was used to collect data during the second national lockdown (February to May 2021). A total of 650 participants (M age 33.13, 71.5% female) comprised the final sample. Results The results show 21.3% of respondents reported moderate-to-extremely severe anxiety, 33% moderate-to-extremely severe depression, 31.8% moderate-to-severe stress, and 38% clinically significant trauma-related distress. Hierarchical linear regression analyses revealed that the strongest contributors to adverse mental health outcomes were being female, of younger age, experiencing increases in verbal arguments at home, being separated from family and close friends, and being unable to afford enough or healthy food. Lastly, participants reported moving away from social support and into more individual strength and resilience-based coping strategies to cope with challenges. Conclusion These findings suggest that in addition to the detrimental effects on physical health, social restriction measures related to COVID-19 also imposed a heavy psychological burden on the population via forced social isolation, which, by design, increased not only physical distancing but also psychological distancing between people.
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is one of the most frequent diseases of the central nervous system in you... more Multiple sclerosis (MS) is one of the most frequent diseases of the central nervous system in young adults. MS believed to be autoimmune and manifests itself mostly as white matter demyelination and associated damage of axons. Various symptoms occur in MS. Cognitive dysfunction is a common symptom occurring in 30-70% of patients at all stages of the disease. The purpose of this study was to investigate the pattern of cognitive dysfunction in different MS subtypes and clinically isolated syndromes suggestive of MS relative to control participants in the Greek population. We suppose that distinct patterns of cognitive dysfunction might occur. We suggest a cognitive science approach of cognitive dysfunction in MS based on impairments on working memory and executive functions. Relapsing remitting patients (RR N=130), secondary progressive patients (SP N=30), primary progressive patients (PP N=30), patients with clinically isolated syndrome (CIS N=42) and healthy control participants (N=...
Purpose The COVID-19 outbreak escalated into a global pandemic, forcing governments around the wo... more Purpose The COVID-19 outbreak escalated into a global pandemic, forcing governments around the world to impose measures affecting all aspects of life. Like other countries, Greece adopted social restriction, lockdowns, and quarantines to reduce transmission from person-to-person. This cross-sectional study investigated the impact of social restriction measures on mental health in a Greek adult sample. Method An online questionnaire collected data during the second national lockdown (February to May 2021). A total of 650 participants (M age: 33.13, 71.5% female) comprised the final sample. Results 21.3% of respondents reported moderate-to-extremely severe anxiety, 33% moderate-to-extremely severe depression, 31.8% moderate-to-severe stress, and 38% clinically significant trauma-related distress. Hierarchical linear regression analyses revealed that the strongest contributors to adverse mental health outcomes were being female, younger age, experiencing increases in verbal arguments a...
Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology, 2013
The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with p... more The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content.
Neurology, 2007
ABSTRACT To investigate the effect of APOE epsilon4 on different cognitive domains in a populatio... more ABSTRACT To investigate the effect of APOE epsilon4 on different cognitive domains in a population of Greek patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). A total of 125 patients with MS and 43 controls were included in this study and underwent neuropsychological assessment with Rao's Brief Repeatable Battery. All patients with MS were genotyped for APOE. The effect of APOE epsilon4 on different cognitive domains was investigated. Fifty-one percent of patients with MS were cognitively impaired. E4 carriers had a sixfold increase in the relative risk of impairment in verbal learning vs noncarriers (OR 6.28, 95% CI 1.74 to 22.69). This effect was domain-specific and was not observed in other cognitive domains assessed by the battery. We found an association of APOE epsilon4 with impaired verbal learning in patients with multiple sclerosis.
Neurology, 2007
ABSTRACT To investigate the effect of APOE epsilon4 on different cognitive domains in a populatio... more ABSTRACT To investigate the effect of APOE epsilon4 on different cognitive domains in a population of Greek patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). A total of 125 patients with MS and 43 controls were included in this study and underwent neuropsychological assessment with Rao's Brief Repeatable Battery. All patients with MS were genotyped for APOE. The effect of APOE epsilon4 on different cognitive domains was investigated. Fifty-one percent of patients with MS were cognitively impaired. E4 carriers had a sixfold increase in the relative risk of impairment in verbal learning vs noncarriers (OR 6.28, 95% CI 1.74 to 22.69). This effect was domain-specific and was not observed in other cognitive domains assessed by the battery. We found an association of APOE epsilon4 with impaired verbal learning in patients with multiple sclerosis.
Multiple Sclerosis, 2008
Elevated ApoA1 levels have been associated with decreased dementia risk. The A-allele of the APOA... more Elevated ApoA1 levels have been associated with decreased dementia risk. The A-allele of the APOA1 -75G/A promoter polymorphism has been associated with elevated ApoA1 levels. We sought to investigate the effect of the APOA1 -75G/A promoter polymorphism on cognitive performance in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). A total of 138 patients with MS and 43 controls were studied and underwent neuropsychological assessment with Rao's Brief Repeatable Battery and the Stroop test. All patients were genotyped for APOA1. APOA1 A-allele carriers displayed superior overall cognitive performance compared with non-carriers (P 0.008) and had a three-fold decrease in the relative risk of overall cognitive impairment (OR 0.29, 95% CI 0.11-0.74). Regarding performance on individual cognitive domains, although APOA1 A-allele carriers performed better than non-carriers on all tests, this was significant only for semantic verbal fluency and the Stroop interference task (P 0.036 and 0.018, respectively). We found an association of the APOA1 -75G/A promoter polymorphism with cognitive performance in MS. This effect was most prominent on semantic verbal fluency and the Stroop interference task.
Journal of the Neurological Sciences, 2008
Objective: To investigate the pattern of cognitive impairment in patients with relapsing-remittin... more Objective: To investigate the pattern of cognitive impairment in patients with relapsing-remitting (RR), secondary progressive (SP), primary progressive (PP) multiple sclerosis, and patients with clinically isolated syndrome (CIS) suggestive of MS, relative to control participants in the Greek population. Methods: RR patients (N = 75), SP patients (N = 29), PP patients (N = 23), CIS patients (N = 33), and healthy control participants (N = 43) were assessed by the Brief Repeatable Battery of Neuropsychological Tests (BRBN).
Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology, 2013
The study tested the cognitive reserve hypothesis by quantifying cognitive reserve (CR) and subse... more The study tested the cognitive reserve hypothesis by quantifying cognitive reserve (CR) and subsequently determining its role in executive function and verbal episodic memory performance. A neuropsychological battery was administered to 383 Greek-Cypriot older adults. A multiple indicators multiple causes (MIMIC) latent construct was utilized to define CR incorporating three indicators: years of education, vocabulary, and reading performance. Findings from two structural equation models supported the moderating role of CR in reducing the direct negative effect of age on verbal episodic memory and on executive function. The study illustrates a parsimonious way of defining CR and provides empirical support for the CR hypothesis.
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Papers by Erasmia Giogkaraki