Conclusion: Place of Cognitive Screening Instruments: Test Characteristics and Suspected Diagnosis

Abstract

Many cognitive screening instruments have been described in the literature over the past 40 years and find use around the world, but this superabundance may be bewildering for the clinician approaching a patient with cognitive complaints. Appropriate test selection may depend on a variety of factors related to the particular clinical situation, including, but not limited to, the time available to undertake cognitive assessment (e.g., primary or secondary care settings), requirement to test general or specific cognitive functions, and the availability of informants. Although many neurological and general medical disorders of varying etiology (neurodegenerative, vascular, inflammatory, endocrine, structural, infective, psychiatric) may cause cognitive impairment, most cognitive disorders in specialist settings result from a relatively small number of conditions, such as Alzheimer's disease, vascular dementia/vascular cognitive impairment, Parkinson's disease dementia and dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), and frontotemporal lobar degeneration syndromes. Clinical suspicion of these entities based on clinical history and physical examination may determine which cognitive screening instruments are best used, as in the investigation of other neurological disorders. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)