Cognitive function in UK community‐dwelling African Caribbean elders: normative data for a test battery

Abstract

Many 'first generation' African Caribbean residents in the UK have now reached ages where risk of cognitive impairment and dementia starts to increase. In addition, conditions which may impair cognitive function, such as hypertension, diabetes and stroke, have high prevalence rates in African Caribbean populations. However, there is a lack of normative data for cognitive tests in this ethnic group. Cognitive assessment was carried out in a south London community population of 285 African Caribbean participants aged 55-75 years. Tests were drawn principally from the consortium to establish a registry for Alzheimer's disease (CERAD) battery (Boston Naming Test, verbal fluency, word list recall, and Trailmaking Tests A and B) and also included orientation items from the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Clock Drawing Test. Independent effects of age, sex, education and occupation were identified on scores for most but not all cognitive tests. Compared with normative data for African American populations, lower scores on verbal fluency and the Boston Naming Test were observed but scores on memory tests were comparable. Normative data for the tests are presented, stratified by level of education.

Education effects on cognitive function in a healthy aged Arab population

“…Frisoni et al (1993) found a correlation between principal lifetime occupations with MMSE scores, independently of the effect of age and education. Independent influences of age, gender, education and occupation on cognitive test scores were reported in a study on African-Caribbean elders (Stewart et al, 2001).…”

Markers of inflammation and cognitive decline in an African‐Caribbean population

“…Cognitive tests were drawn from the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's disease (CERAD) and World Health Organisation (WHO) batteries (Morris et al, 1989;World Health Organisation, 1993). These measures have been validated in cross-cultural settings (Guruje et al, 1995;Welsh et al, 1995), and in this sample (Stewart et al, 2001a). All participants also completed the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE; Folstein et al, 1975;Stewart et al, 2002).…”

Behavioural and psychological signs and symptoms of dementia across cultures: current status and the future

“…Translation should ensure content, semantic, technical, criterion and conceptual equivalence with the parent version of the scale for each and every item (Flaherty et al, 1988;Rait et al, 1997). Several rounds of field pre-testing (Chandra et al, 1994;Ganguli et al, 1995) followed by pilot testing to determine the distribution of scores (Chandra et al, 1994;Ganguli et al, 1996;Rait et al, 2000a, b;Stewart et al, 2001Stewart et al, , 2002 and their ability to discriminate between BPSD of different severity (Chandra et al, 1994;Lindesay et al, 1997) are required. Newly developed instruments should have their psychometric properties rigorously evaluated and they should be similar to the parent version (Shah and Lindesay, 2000).…”