Abstract
The Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination III is one of the most widely used tests to assess cognitive impairment. Although previous studies have shown adequate levels of diagnostic utility to detect severe impairment, it has not shown sensitivity to detect mild decline. The aim of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination III in a large sample of elderly people through Item Response Theory, due to the lack of studies using this approach. A cross-sectional study was conducted with 1164 people from the age of 60 upwards, of which 63 had a prior diagnosis of Alzheimer dementia. The results showed that, globally, the Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination III possesses adequate psychometrics properties. Furthermore, the information function test shows that the subscales have different sensitivity to different levels of impairment. These results can contribute to determining patterns of cognitive deterioration for the adequate detection of different levels of dementia. An optimized version is suggested which may be an economic alternative in the applied field.
Highlights
Dementias are one of the main causes of malfunction and dependency in adulthood [1]
The study attempted to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination (ACE)-III test from an Item Response Theory (IRT) framework
The goodness-of-fit to data to a one-factor model allows us to check the assumptions of unidimensionality and local independence, which are needed for the proper estimation of IRT models
Summary
According to the World Health Organization [2], in 2015 50 million people suffered from some kind of dementia, and the number is expected to triple by 2030. This neurocognitive impairment affects those who suffer from it and their caregivers, family members, the community, and general society. Previous evidence has presented the benefits of early detection and treatment of dementia These benefits are of a clinical nature [3] and economic [4,5,6], social [7], and in terms of public health [8,9], both for the patient and their relatives and caregivers. It is crucial that professionals, both specialists and non-specialists, have access to accurate, timesaving, and easy-to-use screening tools that allow early detection of dementia
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