Comparison of cognitive status profiles of healthy elderly persons with dementia and neurosurgical patients using the neurobehavioural cognitive status examination

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine and compare the cognitive profiles of three groups of Israeli individuals who exhibit cognitive deficits for diverse reasons, using the Neurobehavioural Cognitive Status Examination (Cognistat, former name NCSE). The test is a standardized cognitive screening instrument which includes general areas of alertness, attention, orientation, language (comprehension, repetition, naming), construction, memory, calculations and reasoning (similarities, judgement). Assessment results are provided as a profile of the different domains and graded on four performance levels (average, mild, moderate, severe). Subjects included 47 healthy independent elderly subjects, 47 neurosurgical patients and 42 persons suffering from dementia. Supporting the hypothesized direction, statistically significant differences were found among the three groups on raw scores of all individual subtests and on the four performance levels with the healthy elderly subjects showing the highest performance and persons with dementia the lowest. Construction subtest scores were low for all groups and seemed to detect the aging process as well as disease-related dysfunction. The mean scores and standard deviations of all groups for most subtests were similar or a little lower to those reported in the American standardization data suggesting the test's cross-cultural applicability. In conclusion, the Cognistat was found to be a useful screening test for clinical and research purposes, however, further research is required.