The Short Cognitive Evaluation Battery in Cognitive Disorders of the Elderly – Italian Version

Abstract

Aims: To validate the Italian version of the Short Cognitive Evaluation Battery (SCEB), consisting of 4 tests (temporal orientation, five words, clock drawing and verbal fluency) in healthy controls (CONT), patients with mild Alzheimer’s disease (AD), mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and major depressive disorder (DEP). Methods: Twenty-nine AD patients (mean Mini-Mental State Examination, MMSE, score: 22.1 ± 3.1), 27 MCI patients (mean MMSE score: 26.5 ± 2.0), 27 depressed patients (mean MMSE score: 26.9 ± 2.8), and 48 controls (mean MMSE score: 29.7 ± 0.5) were enrolled. Results: MANCOVA showed highly significant (p < 0.0001) difference among groups. As for total SCEB score, AD were separated from CONT with high accuracy (93%; with sensitivity 93%, specificity 92%, area under ROC curve, AUC, 0.96) and from DEP with satisfying accuracy (84%; with sensitivity 76%, specificity 93%, AUC 0.84). Results in MCI versus CONT comparison yielded more moderate accuracy (80%; with sensitivity 70%, specificity 87%, AUC 0.80), which increased in the subgroup of MCI patients who later converted to AD (85%; with sensitivity 75%, specificity 83%, AUC 0.86). The direct comparison between MCI converters and nonconverters did not yield accurate results. Conclusion: The Italian version of the SCEB is a short (between 6 min in CONT and 12 min in DEP) screening tool in cognitive disorders of the elderly, and is potentially useful in clinical practice.

Semantic interference mechanisms on long-term visual memory and their eye-movement signatures in mild cognitive impairment.

“…The diagnosis of MCI was structured following international guidelines (Arnáiz et al, 2004;Gauthier et al, 2006;Petersen, 2016) and based on the Mini Mental State Examination (see Grigoletto et al, 1999;Measso et al, 1993 for Italian norms) raw score ≥18, family and medical history interviews, as well as imaging data (e.g., MRI) and genetic data (e.g., ApoE), when available. Other inclusion criteria for the current study were: (Dubois et al, 2002; see Girtler et al, 2012 for an application of this test to an Italian sample). In Table 1, we report the descriptive statistics of these tests for the two groups and assess statistical significance using a Welch two-sample t-test (p values are reported in the table).…”

“…The two groups were matched on age, t (45.48) = 1.65, p = 0.1, and years of education, t (47.40) = −0.15, p = 0.9. In order to gather a better picture of the neuropsychological profiles of the two groups, we administered the following battery of tests spanning different cognitive functions: (a) Digit span and Corsi’s Block Tapping Test to assess attention and short-term memory (verbal and non-verbal respectively), (b) Rey’s Complex Figure, copy and delayed, to assess visuo-spatial organization and non-verbal long-term memory, (c) Mesulam’s Cancellation test to assess eye motor coordination and visuo-spatial scanning (letters and symbols), and (d) the Dubois’ 5 Words test to assess free and cued recall (Dubois et al, 2002; see Girtler et al, 2012 for an application of this test to an Italian sample). In Table 1, we report the descriptive statistics of these tests for the two groups and assess statistical significance using a Welch two-sample t -test ( p values are reported in the table).…”

Medico-legal assessment of personal damage in older people: report from a multidisciplinary consensus conference

“…Four couples of reviewers performed a blind inclusion procedure and literature assessment, supported by the literature review expert and the STC members. In summary, 2 guidelines [12,13]; 8 evidence-based synthesis, health technology documents, and documents by scientific societies [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]-in the following, we will indicate with "synthesis of evidence documents" these documents-7 systematic reviews [22][23][24][25][26][27][28]; 3 non-systematic reviews [29][30][31]; 20 primary studies [32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51]; and 10 theoretical/doctrinal documents [7,8,[52][53][54][55][56]…”

“…Overall, the quality of the observational studies was good, while that of systematic and non-systematic reviews was poor (there were no high quality systematic reviews); one of the guidelines was of high quality, while the other was of average quality ( Table 1). Theoretical/doctrinal documents and [33] Primary study *** Brown et al 2017 [22] Systematic review *** Callahan et al 2000 [34] Primary study *** Callahan et al 2004 [35] Primary study **** Chipi et al 2018 [36] Primary study **** Clayman et al 2005 [37] Primary study **** Corbi et al 2018 [38] Primary study **** Deveugele et al 2002 [39] Primary study **** Ferrari et al 2017 [40] Primary study **** Gardner et al 2018 [29] Narrative review * Girtler et al 2012 [41] Primary study *** Hashmi et al 2014 [23] S y s t e m a t i c r e v i e w * Hildebrand et al 2016 [30] R e v i e w * Hogan et al 2011 [31] R e v i e w * Ishikawa et al 2005 [42] Primary study *** Laidsaar-Powell et al 2013 [24] S y s t e m a t i c r e v i e w * * McIntyre et al 2013 [25] S y s t e m a t i c r e v i e w * New Zealand Guidelines Group 2003 [12] Guideline **** Petek Ster et al 2008 [43] Primary study **** Regione Toscana 2017 [13] Guideline *** Reuben et al 2004 [44] Primary study **** Sammy et al 2016 [26] S y s t e m a t i c r e v i e w * * Sawa et al 2018 [27] Systematic review *** Schmidt et al 2009 [45] Primary study *** Storti 2009 [46] Primary study *** Tähepold et al 2003 [47] Primary study *** Wolff et al 2008 [48] Primary study **** Wolff et al 2011 [28] S y s t e m a t i c r e v i e w * * Wolff et al 2012 [49] Primary study **** Wolff et al 2017 [50] Primary study ** Wooldridge et al 2010 [51] Primary study **** synthesis of evidence documents were excluded from the quality assess...…”

“…Additional tools for the evaluation of older patients that are validated in Italian are available [32,36,40,41,46], but evidence on their usefulness in the medico-legal practice of damage assessment is lacking.…”