Accuracy of the semantic fluency test to separate healthy old people from patients with Alzheimer’s disease in a low education population

Abstract

Objective Evaluate the accuracy of two semantic categories of the verbal fluency test (supermarket and animal categories) to separate healthy elderly individuals and lower educated Alzheimer’s disease patients. Methods We evaluated 69 older adults with less than 5 years of schooling, consisting of 31 healthy elderly, and 38 patients diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Semantic verbal fluency was evaluated using the animal and supermarket categories. Mann-Whitney U and Independent t Tests were used to compare the two groups, and the diagnostic accuracy of the tests was analyzed by sensitivity, specificity, likelihood ratio’s, and the Area Under the Curve (AUC). Results We found a significant difference between the healthy older and Alzheimer’s disease groups, in both, animal (p = 0.014) and supermarket verbal fluency (p < 0.001). The supermarket category showed better overall diagnostic accuracy (AUC = 0.840, 95% CI = 0.746-0.933; p < 0.001) compared to the animal category (AUC = 0.671, 95% CI = 0.543-0.800; p = 0.014). Conclusion The supermarket category of semantic verbal fluency provides better accuracy than the animal category for the identification of dementia in a Brazilian elderly population with low educational level.

Validation of an Automated Speech Analysis of Cognitive Tasks within a Semiautomated Phone Assessment

“…However, a possible explanation for the low AUC could be that the supermarket SVF has a lower power in discriminating between SCD and MCI. This is in line with some recent studies in which the supermarket SVF had a relatively higher differentiating power when the diagnostic groups in the cognitive spectrum are further apart [35,36].…”

Verbal Fluency Sebagai Domain Kognitif Yang Paling Memengaruhi Aktivitas Fungsional Lansia Di Pulau Jawa

“…Faktanya, pada penelitian sebelumnya dilaporkan bahwa budaya dan bahasa seseorang berdampak pada bagaimana kinerja mereka pada tes neuropsikologis, tidak hanya terlihat di antara wilayah geografis yang berbeda, tetapi juga berpengaruh dalam masyarakat multikultural. [15,16]…”

Performance on verbal fluency tasks depends on the given category/letter: Preliminary data from a multivariable analysis

“…Moreover, pathological populations may show deficits of different degrees on different SF categories or they may show normative deficits on one but not the other category. One study on SF in Alzheimer’s disease has revealed that the extent of the deficit is dependent on the given category’s size (Diaz et al, 2004), while Moreno-Martínez et al (2017) and Neves et al (2020) found that although the animal fluency is by far the most commonly utilized SF task for research on dementia, other categories such as supermarket items, fruits , and vegetables are more sensitive in distinguishing healthy people from patients with dementia.…”

“…Moreover, pathological populations may show deficits of different degrees on different SF categories or they may show normative deficits on one but not the other category. One study on SF in Alzheimer’s disease has revealed that the extent of the deficit is dependent on the given category’s size (Diaz et al, 2004), while Moreno-Martínez et al (2017) and Neves et al (2020) found that although the animal fluency is by far the most commonly utilized SF task for research on dementia, other categories such as supermarket items, fruits , and vegetables are more sensitive in distinguishing healthy people from patients with dementia. Gabrić and Vandek (2021a) reported that inpatients with first-episode psychosis displayed deficient clustering on the categories animals, vegetables , and musical instruments but not on trees and fruits , despite the presence of a normative deficit in productivity across all categories, while Tagini et al (2021) reported that patients with Parkinson’s disease showed semantically disorganized output on the category fruits but not animals .…”