摘要:
INTRODUCTION: Spatial orientation is considered an essential skill for autonomy and participation in a person's society, allowing its location in the environment. The alteration of this ability, called spatial disorientation, may be present at the beginning of the cognitive decline and progress to Alzheimer's disease, which makes its evaluation of great importance. There is no consensus in the literature regarding a reference standard test for the evaluation of spatial orientation, however recent studies suggest that virtual reality could be used for this purpose. However, whatever known to the authors, there are no immersive systems for assessing spatial orientation. Therefore, our research group developed a system called Spatial Orientation in Immersive Virtual Environment Maze Test (SOIVET-Maze) to assess spatial orientation. However, studies are needed to analyze whether the system really evaluates what is proposed, whether it is applicable and tolerable by the elderly population with and without mild cognitive impairment and, finally, whether its measures will be reliable and stable. OBJECTIVES: To analyze the criterion validity, test-retest reliability and stability, and applicability of the SOIVET-Maze system in elderly people with and without mild cognitive impairment. METHODS: Psychometric study of validation of convergent concurrent criterion, of transversal. Forty-three elderly people were included in the study, 24 with normal cognition, considered to have no complaints and no objective evidence, and 19 with mild cognitive impairment, with proven medical diagnosis, living in the city of Sao Paulo. The study was carried out at the Interdisciplinary Center for Interactive Technologies (CITI) of the Polytechnic School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Sao Paulo. For the sociodemographic and clinical characterization of the sample, the following were applied: screening questionnaire for discomfort before virtual reality; medical and demographic s