Associations of Subjective Memory Complaints and Simple Memory Task Scores With Future Dementia in the Primary Care Setting

The Article in Brief

Associations of Subjective Memory Complaints and Simple Memory Task Scores With Future Dementia in the Primary Care Setting

Lennard L. van Wanrooij , and colleagues

Background Primary care physicians rely on a battery of instruments to assess the risk of dementia in older patients. The combination of screening tools must be simple enough to fit within a regular primary care visit, while being comprehensive enough to distinguish patients in need of referral to specialist memory care.

What This Study Found Analysis of data from a longitudinal cluster-randomized controlled trial of 3,526 adults aged 70 to 78 showed that assessment of dementia risk using three common screening tools at baseline predicts incident dementia over the course of about seven years. A single screening question to assess subjective memory loss was associated with future dementia. Furthermore, participants who showed subjective memory loss, who then reached a threshold score on two cognitive function instrument--the Visual Association Test and the delayed recall item of the Mini-Mental State Examination (item 5--showed rates of dementia up to 30% at follow-up. The authors recommend starting with the single question on subjective memory loss, followed by a brief assessment of cognitive delay from the MMSE-5 and then the VAT.

Implications

• The findings of this study suggest that assessing subjective memory loss using a single question chosen from the 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale, in combination with the MMSE delayed recall item and the VAT, may be a promising way to assess dementia risk in primary care.